


good weird

by fortheloveoflestrade



Category: Stranger Things (TV 2016)
Genre: But my triad need WORK, F/M, FINALLY SOMETHING HAPPENS RE: JON/STEVE, I (heart eyes) JOYCE BYERS, I don't think I'mma get Science-y in this, I'M TOO EMOTIONAL ABOUT THESE BABS, I'll let y'all do that, Inner Toil with Outer Fluff, Karen Wheeler is a Concerned Parent (TM), M/M, Multi, Nancy/Jonathan (developing), Nancy/Steve (established), Nancy/Steve/Jonathan, No More Danger, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Sexism, Polyamory Negotiations, Slow Burn, Steve/Jonathan (slowly), The Kids Are...Okay?, The Teens Aren't Alright, They will eventually be together but I'mma take a while, WE HAVE A TITLE, carol is a marshmellow (not in a good way), just let them be together, language warning, okay i'm sorry we have another fight coming, tommy is tommy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-07
Updated: 2018-08-28
Packaged: 2018-09-22 14:10:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 24
Words: 30,828
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9610871
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/fortheloveoflestrade/pseuds/fortheloveoflestrade
Summary: Nothing is the same when Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan finally return from Winter Break.Now that everything had calmed down, they were just three very different people brought together by impossible circumstances.(slow-burn Nancy/Steve/Jonathan, much inner toil with outer fluff, i'm working out my feelings through them)





	1. Part I

Nothing is the same when Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan finally return from Winter Break. They had coasted on the exhilaration of the win until they were free. But now that everything had calmed down, they were just three very different people brought together by impossible circumstances. 

All of them suddenly recognized the gap in their lives, one that had previously been filled or ignored.

For Nancy, it was the sudden and emotional loss of Barb; her best friend, her confidant, and now one of her only links to her previous life. 

Steve had space left by the expulsion of Tommy and Carol—a much needed removal, but which still left open a part of him that hadn’t been left exposed in years—and stung all the same.

For Jonathan, he certainly knew the emptiness well—he was just usually a lot better at not thinking about it. Now that he knew the importance of other people, that he could no longer take anything for granted, it wasn’t as easy. Not anymore. 

They were all three jagged edges and awkward shapes that didn’t quite fit together, but for some reason kept catching, like velcro on wool, that got harder and harder to tear away with each effort. 

Regardless, it wouldn’t be a smooth ride. All of them were vulnerable and afraid of the world once again, after having thought they had finally figured it out. The new connections felt fragile and unstable; it only made them cling harder to hold on. 

———

Despite having been together before the world turned upside down, Steve and Nancy didn’t fall back into each other immediately. He had crossed a line and she had different ideas about what their relationship was now.

There were many quiet nights after Thanksgiving spent whispering over ignored movies in Steve’s living room. By Christmas they had more or less figured it out again, settling back into each other but with new eyes, new hearts. 

It didn’t feel the same, because they weren’t the same. It felt stronger.

———

Jonathan managed to avoid contact for a while, the distance of others from his brother’s disappearance and reappearance lending him the space to process. He didn’t have a camera to hide behind, anymore, so he mostly just hid completely. 

Nancy and Steve still managed to track him down at lunch, but the meals were often silent and quick.

The present had been Steve’s idea. Actually, he’d bought it before telling Nancy. A week or so before Christmas, she turned up for movie night and found it sitting on the table. Steve had nodded, solemn as he could be, then asked with a funny smile if she would wrap it for him. He sent it home with her and it sat under the Wheelers’ tree quietly.

After Christmas he returned to wearing a camera around his neck constantly, and actually had a couple small conversations with Nancy whenever she caught him while picking up Will.

———

Now here they were. Back at Hawkins High, new semester, no more kiddie gloves or training wheels. 

Nancy had a different lunch period than the boys because of her AP class, but Steve still sat with Jonathan. The table was quiet while they ate, as usual.

When the bell rang for them to head back to class, Steve stood with his tray.

“Hey, Byers?”

Jonathan looks up, confused. “Yeah?”

“We’re watching a movie at Nancy’s tonight because she got stuck babysitting the boys. You should join us if you’re not busy.” He nods, smiles, and then leaves without waiting for an answer.

Which is probably best, because Jonathan doesn’t have one. He gives himself the trip back to his locker to silently freak out, then promptly forgets about it for the rest of the day.

———

Until circumstance conveniently reminds him. 

Sitting at the kitchen table doing their homework, Joyce floats in, oddly light, and says to Jonathan, “Remember I’m working tonight, so you’re in charge of Will, okay?”

Will looks up, “I’m supposed to spend the night at Mike’s. Is that okay?”

Joyce smiles at her younger son, and then slides her eyes over to the elder. “Jon?”

“Yeah, it’s fine,” he says. The memory of the invitation slips in nearly unnoticed, and he’s speaking before he can stop himself, “Nancy and Steve invited me over for a movie.”

Joyce fights to keep her smile small, and fails. “Oh?” she asks. There’s a softness in her eyes, and Jonathan feels like a child again, vulnerable. He doesn’t like it.

He clears his throat, and offers, “They’re watching the boys.”

“How nice,” Joyce purrs, a hand passing over Will’s hair. “Need anything before I go?”

He looks down to avoid her gaze, too light, too hopeful. “Nah, we’re good.”

She nods, begins to exit. “There’s leftover lasagna in the fridge if you get hungry,” she calls, gathering her purse and her coat, “Love you guys.”

“You too,” the boys call back in unison.

“Have fun!” she adds, just before the door shuts behind her. Jonathan exhales and returns to his algebra. 

———

Steve started going to class more often than not. He didn’t strive for perfect attendance like Nancy—it just wasn’t his thing—but he didn’t really have a reason _not_ to go anymore. That had been a Tommy and Carol thing. 

He still did, when every couple of days the stress of life and the boredom of school and the weirdness of everything else caught up to him. At those times, he fled to a secluded spot by the football field for a much-needed cigarette.

That day, the need hadn’t been extremely urgent, but he decided to lope off early anyway. He only made it through one class after lunch before he huffed outside and got comfortable. 

Nancy found him there later, at least an hour after school ended, having smoked four or five butts before stopping. She gingerly sat in the grass across from him, books in her lap and bag over her shoulder. 

She looked like she had a question, but was still deciding whether or not to ask it.

“I’m okay,” he says. He tries a smile. It’s weak, but it’s not nothing.

She returns it. “Okay,” she nods.

“Ready to go?”

“We can sit for a minute or two more.”

So they did. It was sunny but still a little brisk, both of them with their hands buried in their jackets.

“I asked him,” Steve said, finally.

Nancy’s eyebrow arched playfully. _Did you, now?_ “And?”

“He gawked at me for a minute, but I think he’ll consider it.”

“Good,” she replies. She looks down at her lap, suddenly shy.

“You should ask him about the camera,” Steve murmurs, “tonight. If he comes.” 

“Why didn’t you ask him at lunch?” she teases lightly, still holding back.

Steve scoffs. “I don’t know how to act around him. I still don’t know if we’re…okay. I did kind of totally almost ruin his life.”

“But then you helped save his brother’s. And his, and mine. I’m sure that counts for something.”

Steve looks out and down the football field, into the horizon marred by a large blue scoreboard.

“Maybe,” he whispers.

“Are you sure you’re still…okay with all this?”

“Honestly, I don’t know.”

“Tell me,” she pleads.

“The old Steve was a dick, I know that, but some parts of me were still good. I got you, didn’t I?” he asks.

She smiles.

“I’m afraid of losing those parts of myself. Of losing myself entirely. This new world is weird and fucked up and I don’t know how to act anymore.”

“I know,” she whispers, voice shaking slightly. “Me too.”

“Do you think Byers—”

“Yes,” Nancy answers, cutting off his question. “That’s why this is so important.” 

He looks back at her, sees so much going on behind those eyes that it terrifies and amazes him. He loves her. He thought he might have loved her before, but he know he loves her now—because they’re the same. 

“I think that if we try to pretend nothing happened, we’ll all be lost. Our best chance at getting back to somewhere that feels normal is with each other. All of us,” she sighs. 

“I agree,” he adds. “I really do. I don’t care what it means, as long as I have you with me. And him, but I’m working on it. I know what you need. I get it. I’m not afraid of it. But getting there…” he sighs. “It’s not going to be easy.”

“I don’t even know how he—what he’s thinking, feeling. I don’t know how to help him understand, to help him see that it’s okay to want this. That we’re not going to abandon him.”

“He’ll get it. If he feels anything like you do, he’ll see it too,” Steve tells her. “It certainly worked on me,” he adds playfully.

She smiles, sadly but for real.

“Can I kiss you?” he asks.

“Please do,” she laughs, wetly.

And so he does. Like his life depends on it.

———

Jonathan taps his hands nervously on the steering wheel as he drives them to the Wheelers’. His body’s gone into defense mode, immediately expecting the worst. 

Will looks oblivious and content, but Jon knows better. He can see the way his brother is worrying at the hangnail on his thumb; a trait they both inherited from their mother.

The radio burbles quietly into the cab, fuzzy with static and the sound of the engine. It’s nothing he recognizes, but he doesn’t hate it and so he leaves it be. 

The pull up to the driveway and Jonathan turns of the engine. The silence settles him, and the cold, but not entirely.

Will looks up at him from the passenger seat. “Are you staying?” he asks.

“I—I don’t know.”

Will nods. “You should,” he says quietly. “They want to be your friends. Friends are the best,” Will says, meaning it more than anything else ever.

Jonathan knows. Will had friends who had tried to cross worlds for him—and one that had. Jon supposed he did too, thinking about everything he and Nancy had gone through, and how even though Steve had been a total ass he had come through in the end not only for Nancy, but also kind of for Jon. 

Thinking about it did weird things in his chest. He pushed the thoughts down with the shake of his head. 

“Okay,” Jonathan says. “I’ll at least go say ‘hi’.”

Will smiles, and it lights up the dark parts of Jon’s mind, makes them seem friendly again. “Let’s go,” he says.

Jonathan nods. _Once more unto the breach_ , he thinks, but is smiling.


	2. Part II

Steve answers the door, a soda in his other hand. “Hey, Byers!” he greets him, then looks down at Will. “And smaller Byers.”

Will giggles.

“The boys are in the kitchen stocking up on snacks before your grand adventure,” he says dramatically, and steps aside to let them in. 

Will runs off and Jonathan steps inside slowly, clearing the door. Steve lets it shut behind him and pats him briefly on the shoulder. “Good man, Jonathan. Go settle the tie vote. I’m pushing for Star Wars Episode 6, but Nancy’s trying to sneak Risky Business into the mix. I’ve gotta grab the popcorn.”

Jon smiles nervously as Steve saunters off toward the chaos of the kitchen, and then eventually makes his way into the Wheelers’ living room.

Nancy sees him immediately. “Hi!” she says brightly, jumping up from the floor and walking toward him.

He can tell she stops just short of hugging him, and he’s both relieved and disappointed.

“Okay,” she says seriously, hands in front of her. “Star Wars or Risky Business? I don’t really care but I never let Steve think he’s won.” She grins deviously.

Jon feels his face heat up, blood rushing to his cheeks. “I don’t care, either,” he admits.

Nancy nods. “Well then I’ll tell him you voted for Risky Business and let him flounder for a few minutes before I give in.”

He nods, “Okay.”

Steve returns, two more sodas cradled in one arm and a mountainous bowl of popcorn in the other. “What’s the verdict? Please tell me it’s Return of the Jedi.”

Jon shrugs sheepishly, not acting but unsure of what else to do. This is Nancy’s game.

“Sorry, Steve, but Jon agrees that we should watch Risky Business.”

Steve looks affronted. “Come on, man, I was counting on you!” he teases.

“What can I say?” Jonathan says, “I like that old time rock and roll.”

Steve nearly drops the bowl, Nancy placing a hand on Jon’s shoulder to bend over with laughter.

He’s suddenly very embarrassed and also extremely proud of his joke. He knows it wasn’t that funny, but they hadn’t expected it which made the reaction even more satisfying. 

Steve recovers quickly, unwilling to lose his faculties and ruin the snack. “I will agree to Risky Business if you sing that for real when we watch.”

Jon blushes again.

“Actually, I was going to let you have Star Wars, but now I also would like to see that,” Nancy chuckles. Her hand is still on Jonathan’s shoulder, and she seems not to have noticed.

Jonathan doesn’t know how to respond to any of this, so he just stands there quietly until Nancy and Steve’s jubilation wears off and they return to bickering about the movie selection. 

He quietly breathes a sigh of relief when their attention is no longer on him and he forces himself to sit down on the edge of the couch.

Eventually the couple settles on Star Wars. They go to settle on the other end of the couch, Steve by the arm and Nancy tucked up under Steve’s arm.

But not too much, because she’s still dangerously close to Jonathan. She’s not touching him, but if he shifted his weight at all there would probably be some form of contact between them. 

He also notices Steve’s arm around Nancy is not tight, it’s loose and stretched sort of in his direction. It unnerves him. _Is it possessive? Is it casual? Is it even intentional?_

He hasn’t removed his jacket, which means he’s a little warm, but it feels like extra armor between them so he doesn’t take it off. He slowly relaxes as they watch the movie.

Steve makes little jokes here and there or recites lines under his breath. Jonathan feels tired, but a comfortable level that just makes his brain shut down a little and just watch the movie.

The movie ends. Jonathan can’t decide if it felt like minutes or days since they started it. Both, maybe. Nancy gets up to go check on the boys, and Steve stretches out his limbs.

She returns quickly. “They’re still going strong, if you want to watch another one,” she says aloud, probably to both of them but she’s staring at Jon when she says it.

Steve chimes in, “We can watch Risky business if you still want to, babe.” It doesn’t sound like he notices Nancy’s focus. 

Jonathan shrugs to Nancy, his jacket heavy on his shoulders. 

“Can you put it in?” she asks Steve, “I’m going to grab some water.” Nancy disappears again.

“Alright,” Steve says, to no one in particular.

As Steve is distracted with the movie, Jonathan quietly sheds his jacket, placing it at his feet. He also toes off his shoes, and crosses his legs beneath him. He realizes that if he sits like this on the couch, he’s definitely going to be touching Nancy when she sits down again. 

He quickly slides down to the floor instead, back against the couch. That way they aren’t touching and Nancy can stretch out her legs like she wants to. 

_Why do I know that?_ he asks himself.

Steve is unphased by Jonathan’s relocation, but he grabs a can off the table and tosses it to him. 

Jonathan accepts it silently, popping the top with a hiss and taking a sip, the bubbles and sugar having settled to room temperature, but he doesn’t care. He didn’t realize how thirsty he was. 

He’s downed half of it before Nancy returns, returning to the couch with her glass of water and sitting down. 

She does, in fact, stretch her legs out across the couch. Actually, she takes up the entire couch, leaving no room for Steve. He seems untroubled by this, only pausing long enough to decide on mirroring Jonathan’s position at the other end of the couch.

As the movie starts, Nancy works a hand into Steve’s hair, idly playing and stroking. Jonathan looks away quickly, fighting another blush.

Later, he lets his head fall back a little onto the couch cushions. He can feel Nancy’s legs behind him but is too tired and comfortable to bring himself to care.

Even later, Nancy’s nudged her way down the couch a little, so her torso is more evenly between Jonathan and Steve than toward Steve. Steve’s got his head leaned back against her chest, and Nancy’s hand stretches out toward Jonathan.

Toward Jonathan? No, she probably just needs to straighten it out. It’s not towards him, it’s near him. That’s different. 

Steve ends up sort of sideways, almost facing Jonathan, a leg stretched out in front of him that just grazes Jon’s. When Jon looks, Steve’s eyes are on the movie.

He ignores it.

As the movie starts into what Jon remembers as the last ten minutes, he feels Nancy’s fingers on the back of his neck.

They are light, almost not even there, except that they are and Jonathan knows it. She toys with a little bit of his hair by his ear. He wants to look, but she would notice him looking. He hopes she’s not looking at him. He hopes this is an accidental touch.

He wants it _not_ to be.

The touch is warm, and despite the unusualness of the situation, Jonathan begins to drowse. He is only vaguely aware of the movie ending, the room growing darker as the credits roll past, and he can hear Steve and Nancy whispering to each other. He could listen, but his attention is elsewhere.

Her hand is still in his hair. She’s whispering with her boyfriend, but _her hand is in his hair_. And Steve either hasn’t noticed or doesn’t care. Jonathan doesn’t know which is worse.

He hears a quiet sound, relatively unfamiliar but not unrecognizable. They’re kissing. Not full on, not loudly or obnoxiously, but little kisses back and forth. 

_And her hand is still in his hair._

He forces his eyes to stay shut, doesn’t want to break the spell, doesn’t want to look up and see them, having completely forgotten about him. 

More than that, what if they haven’t? They’re doing it anyway. _What does that even mean?_

The sounds stop, and he hears a small, low chuckle. “Sleepyhead,” Nancy says affectionately.

_Him?_ Can’t be. Must be Steve.

But then she runs a finger behind his ear and he cannot stop the involuntary shiver it causes. He just prays she doesn’t notice.

He can’t tell if she does, because she keeps her hand there, still moving softly.

Caught in the middle between absolute comfort and anxious tension, Jonathan somehow falls asleep.


	3. Part III

When he wakes, he can tell it isn’t quite morning yet. For one, it’s too dark. But also, he’s still sitting against the Wheelers’ couch, his back protesting the position in which he fell asleep. 

The tv has been turned off, but Jonathan quickly notices the others around him. Nancy across the couch, Steve on the floor like him but spread out a bit more. 

Steve is dead asleep. But Nancy, her hand still moves gently against Jonathan’s neck, and her other hand is playing with Steve’s hair.

In his semiconscious state, he leans into the touch. Nancy’s voice falls over him, soft, and he lets this happen for just a moment. “Hi,” she says.

“Hi,” he repeats. “Whattime’sit?” he mumbles.

He hears the whisper of her hair when she turns her head to look at her watch, which is luckily on the arm toward Steve. “Three-ish,” she supplies. 

“Boys?” he asks. 

“Been quiet. Probably sleeping.”

A groan rumbles softly between them. “We should be sleeping,” Steve gruffs at them. His eyes don’t open, so Jonathan lets whatever’s happening happen.

“I should go home,” Jonathan says.

“Too far,” Steve mumbles. “Sleep here.”

“Take the La-Z-Boy if you need to stretch out,” Nancy also offers. 

Jonathan wouldn’t move if his life depended on it. “Here’s fine,” he lies.

She doesn’t push, hand settling at the junction between his neck and shoulder. “Then sleep,” she tells him.

And he does.

———

When he wakes again, the warmth of Nancy’s hand on his neck is gone, but there is a blanket delicately draped over him and Steve’s feet are still warm under his leg.

He can hear the boys chattering away in the kitchen, with occasional short additions from Nancy. It seems they are relaying the night’s journey to her in great detail. 

Jonathan smiles. Will was right, of course. Friends are…nice.

“Byers,” he hears, and regrets not checking to see if he was awake before, “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you smile before.”

Jon drops it and turns to look at Steve. He carefully sets his expression as neutral as possible, not wanting to provide any more fodder if Harrington decides to mess with him.

Steve’s eyebrows crinkle at the change. He shrugs. “S’nice,” he mumbles, closing his eyes and turning his head away, still intent on sleep.

Jonathan allows the smile to slip back for a moment before he forces himself up. His back will be sore for a couple days, but he can’t find it in himself to say it wasn’t worth it. He gets up, Steve’s feet shrinking back towards him when their shield disappears, and gathers the blanket around his shoulders. 

The boys barely notice as he enters the kitchen, only Will tossing him a quick grin before returning to the discussion. Nancy’s at the stove, flipping pancakes in a pan, a decent stack of them on a plate nearby.

“Hey,” she offers.

Jonathan nods, “Hey.”

“The boys have already started, so dig in,” she gestures toward the table with the spatula. “Steve awake?”

“Good question,” he hears behind him, slightly startled to find Steve there. His voice is rough with sleep. He hip-checks Jonathan before settling his elbows on the counter and his head in his hands, looking at Nancy. “What’s cookin’, good lookin'?

“Victory pancakes, apparently,” Nancy chuckles. 

Dustin interjects, “We slayed a dragon!”

“Wow,” Steve responds, eyebrows raised. “Impressive.” He looks like he means it.

Steve, suddenly much more awake than he was a few seconds ago, launches himself back up to grab plates out of the cabinet. He hands one back to Jonathan with two pancakes. “Have you eaten yet, babe?”

“Not really,” Nancy replies. “Grab me a plate?” He does. 

There’s a loud rush of discussion which promptly ends with the boys all rushing back downstairs to the basement, vacating the table for the older teens.

Jon takes the nearest open chair. Steve takes the one across from him, and puts Nancy’s plate at the place between them. 

_Why does he keep doing that?_ Jonathan asks himself. _Is he using Nancy as a buffer? Seems like he would try to keep me away from his girlfriend…_

He lifts an eyebrow at Steve but says nothing. Nancy turns off the stove and tidies some of the mess, then comes to sit down between them.

Steve drowns his cakes in syrup. Actually drowns them. There is more syrup on the plate than pancake, in Jon’s opinion.

Nancy does a quick drizzle, and adds a pat of butter. 

Jonathan doesn’t add anything. Syrup is too sweet, butter unnecessary. They’re fine just how they are.

They eat in what Jonathan can only guess is companionable silence—not having ever experienced it before, he can’t know for sure.

Steve breaks it, letting out a belch that nearly shakes the table. After, he smiles so wide Jonathan laughs without thinking.

Nancy smacks him playfully, but she’s smiling too.

_“Excusé moi,”_ he says, with an accent that is most definitely not French. It sounds ridiculous. “I need OJ,” he says standing. “Nance? Jon?”

“Sure, babe,” Nancy says. 

Jon shrugs, “Okay.” He doesn’t really care, but he has a feeling that once it’s in front of him he’ll realize just how thirsty he actually is. 

He’s right. Once Steve hands it over, he downs the whole thing in two gulps.

“Damn, Byers, slow down before you choke yourself,” Steve chuckles, once again sawing away at his pancakes. 

Jonathan puts the cup down gently and looks down at his food.

“Ignore him,” Nancy whispers. Steve pretends not to hear her, and so Jonathan nods.

———

Later, as Steve and Jonathan are guilted into doing the dishes, the phone rings.

Nancy answers it. “Wheeler House of Pancakes,” she chirps. Steve guffaws.

Jon focuses on the plate he’s drying while half-listening.

“Oh, don’t worry, Mrs. Byers. Jonathan’s here, they’re both here. No need to worry.”

“Shit,” Jonathan mumbles to himself. He should have left a note. Or called. Or just gone home. 

“No problem, ma’am. You too. Bye.” She hangs up. She turns to Jonathan. “Don’t worry about it. She sounded fine,” she adds. Jonathan knows Joyce has had enough of looking for lost sons for a lifetime, and Nancy can read his expression like a book.

“I should’ve called her,” he says. 

“Seriously, Jonathan, it’s okay. She actually sounded surprisingly chipper for this early in the morning.”

He thinks about how happy she had been last night. The suspicions tug at the back of his head. He sighs, “I think she’s secretly seeing Chief Hopper.”

“Damn,” Steve says, but doesn’t continue.

“She said she was working last night, but I think some nights she goes to see him. She’s been…happier lately.”

“That’s good, yeah?” Nancy asks tentatively.

Jon shrugs. “I guess. I don’t know why she doesn’t just tell us.”

Steve nudges his shoulder. “Adults like to have secrets, too. Probably makes it even sexier.”

Jonathan pretends to retch. “Eew.”

“I think it’s sweet. Didn’t they have, like, a _thing_ when they were younger?” Nancy asks.

“I don’t know,” Jonathan says, “she doesn’t talk about stuff like that.”

“Well, I’m sure it’s all fine,” Nancy says, effectively ending the conversation. She didn’t want to push Jonathan into talking about it, and he didn’t seem eager to keep talking.

The boys finish washing dishes quietly. Nancy tidies the rest of the kitchen and table. Occasional sounds of the boys come from downstairs.

It’s strangely okay.


	4. Part IV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Period-typical homophobic language.

The rest of the weekend seems to pass at a snail’s pace, but then Jonathan blinks and it’s Monday morning. He hates it, how time is so fickle now.

Monday means school, which is fine; it means lunch with Steve, which is mostly fine; but it also means he has to work that night, which is…unpleasant.

It’s not as if he hates work, he would just rather not. He wants to go home, do his homework, and relax. Hang out with his brother. Listen to some music. Like a normal teenager.

But he also knows that nothing normal, not anymore. So he deals. He goes to work, is only slightly miserable, and then goes home. 

He can’t bring himself to hate it fully, having to ride the fence between kid and adult, because he knows it helps keep them afloat. He would give anything to keep his family.

But for the first time in as long as he can remember, something—somebody—matters to him outside of that. 

And it scares him shitless.

———

By lunch, Jonathan is actually itching for some human contact. He is pleasantly surprised to find not only Steve, but also Nancy waiting for him at lunch.

“Nancy? What are you doing?” he asks.

She smiles. “I convinced Mrs. Resznick to let me switch my independent study and my lunch period.”

“Because she missed us,” Steve croons at her. She giggles, and doesn’t disagree with him.

Jonathan can feel himself blushing.

Nancy and Steve are sitting on opposite sides of the table, which leaves Jonathan with the minor crisis of where to sit.

Does he sit by Nancy and risk Steve’s wrath? Does he sit by Steve and make it weird? 

Nancy decides for him, by sliding down the bench just enough to make room for him. He sits quickly, trying not to think about it. When he looks up from his tray, Steve is smiling and chatting with Nancy, no change in his expression.

 _Oh_ , Jonathan thinks. _Okay. This is okay._

In fact, he notices Nancy casually touching him quite a bit. Not nearly as much as she does with Steve, but a significant amount more. He doesn’t even think she realizes she’s doing it.

In fact, he doesn’t think Steve does either. They simply float in his orbit, brushing him occasionally, neither excluding him nor crowding him. 

It’s really quite nice. He wishes it didn’t make him so anxious.

When lunch is over, they walk out of the cafeteria together, headed in roughly the same direction. Steve slings an arm over his shoulders, and the other over Nancy. Jonathan forces himself to walk normally.

“We should do another movie night sometime. Maybe at my place? Less kids,” he laughs.

Nancy hums in agreement, and then looks at Jonathan. 

He shrugs, but of course Steve can tell. “Dude, I have a way better selection, a monster tv, and a damn comfortable couch. It’s like my living room was made for movie night,” Steve grins.

Jonathan searches for an excuse. He doesn’t look very hard before giving up. “When?”

Steve pats his shoulder. “Whenever, man. Nance?”

They stop, and Steve drops his arms. 

“You’re working this week, right?” she asks Jonathan. 

He nods, curious as to how she knows his work schedule but not interested in asking.

“We could do Friday night again? No school the next day,” she points out.

“I’m off Friday, but I’ll probably have Will.”

“Oh, I’m sure he’ll be at my house,” Nancy shrugs. 

“And if not,” Steve adds, “bring him. Smaller Byers seems pretty chill to me.”

Jonathan eyes Steve cautiously. “Yeah, Friday is almost always D&D.”

“And my parents will be home, so we’re off the hook,” Nancy adds.

“And your parents?” Jonathan asks Steve.

Steve clears his throat, and for a moment Jonathan thinks he’s said something completely stupid, but then Steve smirks and says, “They’ll be working, they won’t mind.”

Jonathan has a feeling they probably don’t mind because they don’t know, but if they’re going to leave their teenage son home alone he figures at least he should have some kind of social life. 

“Okay, Friday,” Nancy says.

“Sure,” Jon says. The late bell rings. “Shit, let’s go.”

———

Steve and Nancy don’t see much of Jonathan that week except during lunch. They see each other before and after school, but Nancy is otherwise busy with schoolwork. 

Steve takes a smoke break on Wednesday during last period. He starts to head for his normal spot, but gets intercepted along the way.

“Hey, Stevie.”

 _Shit._ “What do you want, Tommy?”

“You look awful sweet with your two-timing girlfriend. But what’s with the Byers kid? You gotta thing for him, too?”

Steve clenches his fist, knuckles white around the unlit cigarette in his hand. “What do you care?”

“Well, I think it’s interesting how you went from a back-alley brawl with him to being so hunky dory. Did Nancy make you say ‘sorry’? Makes you play nice with the idiot you caught her with like she’s not fucking him behind your back.”

“They’re not,” he says, trying to keep his voice calm. “They’re just friends. We’re all friends. They’re better friends than you two ever were.”

Tommy plays offended, a hand to his chest. “Wow, the slut and the fag are better friends than us? Who’da thunk it?”

Steve lets the cigarette pull apart in his hand, tobacco trickling from his fingers, the filter pressing into his palm. But he stays still.

“I never thought you’d be dumb enough to get whipped, Stevie, but getting whipped by that whore? That’s just sad. How does it feel to know you’re getting Byers’ leftovers, huh?”

Steve’s fist meets Tommy’s jaw, and before either of them have time to process it, Steve’s taken off and left Tommy with a fat lip. 

He’d just wanted him to shut up. He didn’t really need to hit him. He runs until he reaches his car and peals out of the school parking lot as fast as he can. He didn’t want to start a fight today, but he couldn’t let Tommy get away with saying shit like that.

He doesn’t notice the bruise forming across his knuckles as he grips the steering wheel, doesn’t feel the muscle pull tight until he’s home and in his bathroom, digging out the first aid kit from beneath the sink.

———

He’s half-expecting her when she shows up on his doorstep. 

She doesn’t let herself in, always cautious of his parents’ inconsistency for coming home. He opens the door and lets her walk in without a word. He returns to where he’d settled on the couch, with a bag of frozen peas on his hand and the tv on mute in front of him, ignored.

She doesn’t ask what happened. She doesn’t have to. She sits next to him, settling her head on his shoulder. “Are you okay?” she asks softly.

“I’ll be fine,” he says. “The hand will heal. I hit the ground running before he had time to hit back.”

She nods into his arm. “Will you go back to school tomorrow?”

“No point in hiding. If he wants to get even, he’ll do it whether I go or not. Not going to bail for two days and look like a pussy.”

He sighs, adjusting the bag of peas. They were starting to thaw. He’d have to put them back soon.

“I hate that he knows exactly how to piss me off. I hate that I gave him something to hold over us just because I was a jealous dick. I hate that I ever let that asshole into my life, my head. I hate that I’ve put a target on us. On Byers. On you.” He lifts his unhurt hand to smooth over her hair.

She leans up to meet him, pressing her lips to his. 

“I’m sorry,” he whispers into the space between them.

“I know,” she breathes.

She takes the bag of peas from him and returns it to the kitchen, then comes back, grabs his good hand and leads him up the stairs.


	5. Part V

Jonathan doesn’t hardly notice Steve’s hand at lunch the next day. At least, it seems that way.

But as the bell rings, he asks. “Who was on the receiving end of that?”

“Tommy,” Steve says. “Tried to start something. I wasn’t in the mood.”

“Huh,” Jonathan says, and that’s that.

———

Friday comes. At lunch, the conversation is normal: a lot of Steve and Nancy with small bits of Jonathan when they feel like it. He likes that they don’t push him to be part of the conversation.

Most of the time, he just wants to listen anyway.

At the end of it, Steve clears their trays and sweeps up beside Jonathan and Nancy. “You know how to get to my house?” he asks the other boy.

Jonathan tries not to flinch. “Yeah, I think so,” he lies. 

Steve barely registers what’s just happened before Nancy’s taken over.

“So, like, seven?”

“Yeah, I’ll head over after I drop Will off. Will you need a ride home, Nancy?”

After a beat, he regrets asking. Maybe she’s staying with Steve. He doesn’t want to know.

But she answers anyway. “Yeah, if it’s no trouble. My mom wants me home by twelve.”

“I have to grab Will again anyway, so no trouble.”

“Thanks, Jonathan,” Steve smiles. “Less work for me.” Jonathan nods before he lets himself stare too long.

———

“Alright, as host, I am invoking my right to impose movie selection in this dire situation. It’s gonna be a Monty Python night!”

“But I wanted to watch Annie Hall!” Nancy objects.

“Next time, babe,” he says, with a smile. “But seeing as our pal Jonathan has never seen them, I am temporarily ruling this democracy a dictatorship.”

“It’s not that big a deal,” Jonathan says.

Steve puts a hand on his shoulder, looking at him rather seriously. “Yes, Jonathan Byers, it is. It is a travesty! I cannot allow it to continue.”

Jonathan blushes, bats Steve’s hand away gently. “Fine,” he says.

“Only if I get to choose pizza toppings,” Nancy negotiates. 

Steve raises an eyebrow at Jonathan. 

He shrugs. He’ll eat pretty much anything.

“Agreed,” Steve says, sticking out his good hand.

Nancy takes it, giving him a strong shake. 

“Damn, Nance,” Steve groans, exaggerated, shaking out his hand when she releases it. “Messed up my other hand.”

She scoffs, and walks away toward the kitchen phone.

Steve beams.

———

Steve’s couch is larger than the Wheelers’, but that doesn’t mean much to Nancy. She soaks up as much space as she’s given.

For a moment, she just sprawls out completely. But then she shivers, just a little. Jonathan is watching her, and he just now realizes Steve’s house is a bit chillier than hers. Must be the extra space, he thinks.

She catches him watching. Before he has time to get embarrassed, she pulls her feet in and nods her head toward the new opening beside her. 

Jonathan takes it, unsure of how he could ever try to say no to Nancy Wheeler.

Steve materializes from wherever he had run off to with large blankets in his arms. He tosses one at each of them, hitting them both square in the face, and then approaches Nancy’s end of the couch.

Without a fight, he squishes her aside enough to sit down. Then she simply melts into him, tucked up into his side with the blanket already draped over her. 

Jonathan crosses his legs, fringing on the edge of Nancy’s space. She burrows her toes under his blanket and against his thigh, his hand finding its way to her foot, resting between arch and heel on top of the soft fleece. 

She hums quietly, and so he leaves his hand there. It’s in full view of Steve. He’s starting to pick up on the fact that Nancy’s physical affection just simply is; Steve accepts it even when not directed at him. 

The increase in contact unfamiliar to Jonathan, but not unwelcome. And if Steve’s not going to try and stop her, Jonathan might as well let her. 

They start with the Holy Grail, and all three of them are laughing in minutes. Steve recites lines without hesitation. Nancy even chimes in, obviously having received this treatment from Steve before now. 

———

How long later, Jonathan doesn’t know, but the doorbell rings. 

“I got it,” Steve announces, vacating the couch and dislodging Nancy in the process, who had kind of half-ended in his lap.

Jonathan can feel her shiver again, and then her foot slips from beneath his hand only to have most of his side crowded by her. 

She repositions the blanket to cover her feet, and leans her head on Jonathan’s shoulder. “It’s so cold in here,” she murmurs. 

He nods, not trusting his voice.

Steve returns, pizza box in hand. He only glances at the scene for a second before smiling. “Pizza!” he peals.

He drops the box to the table in front of the couch and opens it, already gathering up a slice. They all take a few minutes to eat and chat.

Nancy stays close while Steve quizzes Jonathan about the first movie. He answers, mostly, in between bites of pizza and nearly choking on it in laughter. 

After they’ve managed to knock out two-thirds of the pizza, everyone begins settling back in while Steve switches movies. Nancy stays huddled against Jonathan, and when Steve returns he sits down next to Nancy and unceremoniously drops his head into her lap. She giggles, and it vibrates through Jonathan.

Nancy uncovers one of her hands to thread through Steve’s hair. For a moment, he arches into it like a cat, the movement jostling both Jonathan and Nancy, and then relaxes again. 

The movie begins.


	6. Part VI

Halfway through the second movie, Nancy gets up to use the bathroom. 

While she’s gone, Steve forces himself upright and crosses his legs, a lot closer to Jonathan. “Do you like it?” he asks.

“It’s great, man.”

“Which one do you like better? Holy Grail of Life of Brian?”

Jonathan shrugs. “They’re both good, but I think I like Holy Grail more.”

“Yeah, me too. Nancy likes Life of Brian. I think it’s the singing,” he jokes. 

Jonathan nods. He can remember hearing bits and pieces whispered under her breath. 

Nancy comes back, knocking him out of his thoughts. “What are you two whispering about?” she teases, hands on her hips.

“Aw, nothin’,” Steve says, looking dismissive. “Just your lovely singing voice.”

“Well, then, keep talking!” she insists, dropping down into Steve’s lap. Her legs stretch across Jonathan’s lap, and she looks at him for a moment. “Is this okay?” she asks. 

Steve struggles with the remote with his arms wrapped around Nancy. Jonathan glances at him before nodding. “S’fine,” he says. 

“Good. Now cover up my feet, it’s freezing.”

Jonathan laughs.

———

The movie finishes around eleven. 

Jonathan is in the kitchen, getting a glass of water, when he hears it. First, a giggle, and then something different. Breathier. 

_A moan?_ It hits him in the pit of his stomach, and continues moving. 

Then there’s more giggling, and then it’s moving toward the kitchen. “Jonathan,” he hears Nancy cry. It’s decidedly different from every other time she’s shouted his name, at lot less afraid. He likes it. He shakes his head at himself. _Stop._

She runs in, Steve on her heels, and crashes right into him. His arms go around her by instinct, and she’s still laughing.

“You are terrible, Steve Harrington,” she laughs.

“I don’t know what you’re talking about,” Steve says innocently, hands behind his back.

She looks up at Jonathan from in his arms. “Tell him, Jonathan, tell him he’s terrible and should leave me alone.” 

He doesn’t know what game they’re playing, but it’s starting to confuse him. His body doesn’t know how to handle this in a way that’s not fight or flight—neither of which seem particularly appropriate right now.

“Hey,” Steve whines, lifting a hand to Jonathan’s shoulder. “Byers, pal, I wasn’t doin’ nothin’, I swear.” He can see the smile in Steve’s eyes.

“Liar,” Nancy giggles, not looking at all like she means it.

Jonathan doesn’t know how to respond, so he just shakes his head and tries to smile. It probably comes out looking like a grimace.

Nancy doesn’t fully detach, but backs up a little in his space. As usual, she can see right through him. Steve takes the hint and drops his hand.

“Tonight was fun,” she says. “Same time next week?” 

Steve laughs. “Please.”

———

Steve waves them off from the front door. Nancy leans forward to mess with the heating. The radio burbles quietly.

Jonathan doesn’t know what to say, so he doesn’t say anything. He taps a hand on the steering wheel to the quiet beat on the radio. 

“Hey, Jonathan?” Nancy asks.

“Yeah?”

“How’s Will doing?”

Jonathan swallows. “He’s good. Has bad dreams, sometimes, but he’s doing a lot better.”

“Good,” Nancy hums. She pauses. “And you?”

He chances a look at her. Her face is soft, but worry still seeps through. He turns back to the road. “I’m okay,” he says. 

He hears the rustle of her hair on her jacket when she nods. 

“What about you?” Jonathan asks.

“Me? I’m…good. I’m okay,” she sighs. “It still hurts, you know, but I’m doing okay.”

“I’m glad,” he says quietly.

“Steve helps,” she adds. “And you.”

“Me?”

“Of course,” she insists. “I…I lost my best friend. I don’t think that will ever stop hurting. But having you and Steve, it helps. _A lot_ ,” she exhales. “Thank you.”

He pulls up at the end of her driveway, and turns off the engine.

“You don’t need to thank me,” Jonathan says. He drops his hands into his lap, keys jingling slightly. 

“But I want to,” she tells him.

“I should be thanking you,” he counters. “I don’t know why you and Steve hang around me, honestly.”

“Don’t say that,” she whispers. 

“It’s true. I don’t know how to do this, Nancy, I’ve never had this before,” he admits. His voice softens. “Friends, people who—”

She’s kissing him.

 _Oh, god._ Nancy Wheeler is kissing him. _Him, Jonathan Byers._

Nancy is kissing him. Nancy has a boyfriend. Nancy’s boyfriend is Steve. _This is bad._

This is very, very bad. But.

_But._

By the time his brain catches up, she’s pulled back slightly. She’s still very close, breathing in the same space, and somehow her hand is on his cheek.

“Care,” she finishes for him. 

“Yeah,” he says, all breath.

“Is this okay?” she asks him, not for the first time that night. Although this time seems very different. 

“I…” his breath catches, “I don’t know.” He breathes in, out. “Steve,” he says.

Nancy shakes her head. “I want to know if you think this is okay,” she repeats, forehead resting against his.

He closes his eyes, unable to give her an answer. 

She kisses him again, shorter this time, and then backs away completely. “Think about it,” she tells him. “We have time.”

“But, but you’re with Steve.”

“I am,” she says. “But I want to know about this, and that doesn’t matter right now.”

“How can it not matter?” Jonathan asks, quiet but frustrated. “Last time he thought something was going on, it didn’t go very well!”

“He’s over it, you know that.”

“That doesn’t suddenly make this okay, though.”

“No, it doesn’t,” she agrees. “What makes it okay is that he knows.”

“ _What?_ ” Jonathan panics.

“I told him. How I feel. And he’s okay with this.”

Jonathan has a thousand things to say, and a million more questions, but nothing comes out. He’s gone speechless.

“Just…think about it,” she says again. “I’ll send Will out. Goodnight, Jonathan.”

And then she’s gone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> STUFFS HAPPENING
> 
> So apparently I'm posting these in chunks of three?  
> I don't know. I'm just writing as I go, editing when I get stuck, and posting what's done at the end of the day.  
> (Technically, part seven is done, but it doesn't quite feel polished, so). 
> 
> I'm getting myself into too many heavy dialogue scenes. I'm not so good at those. Hopefully I can keep up some pace with this one?
> 
> I don't actually know where I want this to end, I'm just writing what feels natural.
> 
> Wow, I talk a lot. Bye!


	7. Part VII

Conveniently, Jonathan has a whole weekend to avoid Nancy and Steve. The one time he drives Will to the Wheelers’ he doesn’t get out, making an excuse about grabbing something from the store. Will doesn’t really seem to care, but he does give him a weird look for his trouble.

On Sunday night, he’s still completely baffled by it all.

Nancy likes him. Nancy wants to be with him.

Nancy likes Steve. Nancy is with Steve. 

She wants to be with both of them. Steve maybe thinks this is okay.

He can’t decide which part is more unbelievable. That Nancy actually likes him, or that Steve is totally fine with Nancy wanting to be with both of them.

It makes his stomach twist uncomfortably. 

He wants Nancy, of course he does. But wanting her from afar was a lot easier when she didn’t feel the same way.

And he can’t just agree to be with her without talking to Steve. What if she’s lying? 

She wouldn’t be, he knows that, but the truth almost seems too impossible to face. 

He knows he cannot give her a straight answer without at least talking to Steve, as bad of an idea as that may be. 

They’re kind of a unit now. He wants to keep being friends with Nancy and Steve. He doesn’t want to pick one over the other. They’ve stuck with him this long now, that forcing either of them to suddenly be the outsider hurts too much to consider. 

He knows what that’s like, and he won’t do it to them. Regardless of the romantic conflicts. He’d rather go back to being on his own than force them to give up one another. 

When had his priorities gotten so mixed up in Steve and Nancy’s relationship?

His head hurts, trying to process it all. He decides he’ll talk to Steve tomorrow. He can’t do anything without doing that first. 

He puts on a record and reaches for his headphones. He lets his mind get wiped clean by the music, and eventually he falls asleep.

———

_“Jonathan.” Nancy is calling for him. “Jonathan,” he hears again._

_“Nancy?” he responds. He cannot see her. It is dark. “Where are you?”_

_“Byers.” That’s not Nancy. That’s Steve. “Hey, Jonny.”_

_Suddenly, he’s back in the alley. Nancy’s just slapped Steve. Steve’s yelling horrible, terrible things at him about his family._

_He expects the memory to continue, to suddenly be fighting Steve, but it doesn’t._

_Nancy takes his hand and they walk out of the alley together. They turn the corner, and Steve comes running after them._

_“Please, wait!” he calls behind them._

_He looks back. It is only Steve. His face is mangled, like it was after they fought, but they didn’t fight. Why does he look like that?_

_Jonathan looks down at his hand wrapped in Nancy’s. It, too, has the marks from the fight. He stops, takes back the hand. Nancy stops too, turns to him._

_“What do you want?” she asks him._

_“I don’t know,” he says._

_Steve catches up to them. “Dude,” he says, breathing heavily._

_“I don’t know what I want,” Jonathan tells him._

_“Why not?” Steve asks. “Isn’t it obvious?”_

_Nancy takes Steve’s hand, now._

_“Take us or leave us, Jonathan,” she says, sadly._

_“I just want to stay like this,” he pleads, “please.”_

_There is a light behind them that gets more intense. It starts to blind him._

_“Just like this,” he says again, losing them to the light._

———

Monday crawls by. It feels like days before lunch, which just makes Jonathan want to bail even more.

Eventually, though, he gets there. He is the first at the table. He forces himself to sit. He waits, and worries at a hangnail on his hand.

Someone slides in across from him. Only one someone. He looks up.

“Steve,” he says.

“Hey, Jonny,” Steve responds, with a nervous smile.

“Where’s Nancy?”

“Finishing up a lab or something,” he shrugs, “She’ll be back tomorrow.”

“Oh,” Jonathan answers.

They eat in relative silence for several minutes. Jonathan’s heart is pounding.

Steve is tapping anxiously on the edge of his tray, watching him.

“I’ll start, then,” Steve says suddenly.

Jonathan looks up, horrified.

“Do you like Nancy?” Steve asks. His expression is carefully neutral.

“Um,” Jonathan says. 

“Dude, it’s fine. Just answer honestly.”

“Um,” he says again, “yes?”

Steve nods. “Me, too.” 

“Yeah.”

“And she likes you.”

“You too,” Jonathan adds quickly.

Steve smiles. “I know,” he says softly.

“I don’t…”

“You don’t what?” Steve asks.

“I don’t…want to mess anything up,” Jonathan finishes. “I want everything to stay the same.”

“Exactly the same?”

“I don’t want to mess anything up,” he repeats. “Maybe I should go.”

“Why?” Steve asks him, and seems genuinely confused.

“Nancy is your girlfriend,” Jonathan says.

“Yeah. So?”

“So? So how are you okay with this?”

Steve shrugs. “I love her,” he says, “and I want her to be happy.”

“Then what was all that before, huh?” Jonathan spits. “How is this different?”

“Because I’m different,” Steve says. “And she’s different. And you’re different. It’s all different now, Byers. What happened before…was stupid. I was stupid, and listening to other stupid people. I overreacted, and I was horrible to you both. I’m sorry.”

Jonathan is quiet.

“What does any of it matter anymore?” Steve says, exasperated. “If the world is going to dick with us, then we should get to do whatever we want, right?”

“It feels wrong,” Jonathan whispers. “It feels wrong to want her.”

“It’s not.”

“Will it make things weird? I don’t want things to be weird again. I like how we are now, I don’t want us to be weird.”

“It might be, just for a little while. But I swear, I wouldn’t have said yes if I didn’t think it would all be okay.”

Jonathan breathes in, out. “Okay,” he croaks, unsure of what else he could say.

Steve smiles. “Okay,” he nods.

“What does this mean for…us?” Jonathan asks. His hand barely moves, fingers twitching from his direction toward Steve.

“Honestly, man,” Steve says, “I don’t know. But we’ll figure it out,” he says. 

It sounds too much like a promise.

Jonathan only hopes Steve can keep it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm feeling very angsty rn.
> 
> Also, I fall victim to dream sequence clichés. Expect that to come up again, I'm too easy.
> 
> I'M NOT GOOD AT HEAVY DIALOGUE I'M SORRY


	8. Part VIII

Steve finds Jonathan again when school’s over, intercepting him on his way to the dark room. 

“Hey,” he says. Jonathan can tell why he’s there.

“Dark room,” is all he says, jerking his head in that direction. He continues on his way without waiting for Steve.

A few minutes later, as he’s washing his first photos, there’s a hollow knocking.

He clear his throat, “It’s open.”

He angles his back toward the door to block any light from hitting the photos, and it opens and closes behind him.

There’s a warm hand on his back.

“Jonathan?” Nancy asks quietly.

He takes a deep breath. He turns to her. “Hey,” he says, smiling.

Her nervous eyes light up.

———

It becomes part of the crazy routine they’re creating.

Steve drives Nancy to school, they all eat lunch together, Nancy comes and sits with Jonathan in the dark room, he drives her home.

The week floats by quickly, time both suspended and sped up in the dream-like haze.

Suddenly, it’s lunch on Friday, and Jonathan is only half-listening to Nancy and Steve’s quiet chatter.

“Are we still on for movie night?” Nancy asks.

There’s a pause, and he can feel their eyes on him. He looks up.

Steve smirks, but his eyes are cautious. “I don’t know, Byers. What do you think?”

His stomach flip-flops for a second. He hasn't been alone with the two of them since…before. They’ve either been cushioned by the atmosphere of school or they've been one-on-one with Nancy.

But he wanted things to stay the same. Wants things to stay the same. 

“Yeah,” he mumbles. “Why not?”

The two of them shine back at him, the light of the midday sun behind them. 

He remembers his dream. _This,_ he thinks, _is exactly right._

———

“Hey, Mom?”

“Yes?” Joyce asks, floating around the kitchen distractedly.

“Can I go out after I drop Will off at the Wheelers’?”

“Of course, Jonathan,” she smiles. “Go where?”

“Another movie night,” he admits, looking away. 

“That sounds fun,” she coos, rummaging through her purse. “Have you seen my keys?”

“Did you check the hook?”

“Um,” she says. “No.”

“Check the hook.”

He hears the keys jingle as she takes them. 

“Thank you, sweetheart,” she says, running a hand over his back. “I’ve got to go. Kiss your brother for me,” she says.

“I will,” he tells her. “Have a good time.”

She stops. “At work?” she questions.

“At work,” he nods, “or…wherever.”

There’s a long pause before he hears the keys again, and then his mother’s lip are on his cheek.

“Thank you,” she whispers, and then she’s walking out the door.

Jonathan breathes. _Finally._

———

Jonathan’s earlier sureness dissolves quickly as he and Nancy drive over from the Wheelers’. 

He drops a hand beside him, shaking out some of the tension.

Nancy sees this, and takes it gently. Jonathan looks over, sees the hope in her eyes, and squeezes.

She smiles.

She kisses him before they get out of the car. “Hey,” she whispers. “How are you doing?”

She checks in with him frequently, aware of how much of this is new to him. He appreciates it, but it also terrifies him.

“I think I’m okay,” he says. “You?”

“I’m great,” she laughs.

 _She’s so beautiful._ He kisses her. It’s the first time he’s initiated, and she hums beneath him. Just in case this all crashes down disastrously, he wants her to know he wants her.

When they break apart, Nancy looks toward the door of the house. There Steve stands, grinning like usual. He waves to them. 

Jonathan laughs. “This is so weird,” he says.

“So weird,” Nancy agrees, climbing out of the car, “but still good.”

She greets Steve with a kiss. Jonathan looks away.

They all go inside.

Nancy floats forward, turning back to them. “So, Annie Hall?”

———

The movie quickly passes, Jonathan only half watching. Nancy’s decided to spread across both boys, head in Jonathan’s lap and feet in Steve’s. 

Honestly, Jonathan had expected Steve to get a little possessive. Not a lot, but enough to assert that Nancy was still his, too. He is surprisingly relaxed. Jonathan can’t decide if it makes him nervous or grateful. 

They break for pizza. Jonathan gets up to grab them all water, and Nancy kisses his cheek as he goes. 

He stays in the kitchen until he stops blushing.

When he comes back, Nancy is in Steve’s lap, and they’re whispering quietly to each other.

The sight actually calms Jonathan down. Just right, he thinks again. Just like this.

Nancy bullies them into another movie, once again her choice, and somehow they end up watching Nine to Five.

Really, she doesn’t even have to try. Steve pretends to argue, but Jonathan sits and lets it happen.

She sings along to the opening number, Steve and Jonathan laughing the whole time.

———

Jonathan starts to doze somewhere after the middle. When he crawls back to consciousness, he finds himself sort of laid out on the couch, Nancy laid out in front of him, Steve still sitting at his end. He has Nancy’s feet in his lap again. Jonathan’s feet are pushed up under his legs.

Nancy’s turned around to face him, playing with the hair around his face.

“Sleepyhead,” she mumbles, when his eyes flutter open. 

He nods, and their foreheads touch briefly. 

“Can I kiss you?” she asks quietly.

He is suddenly very aware of Steve’s presence. Everything in him tells him no, but he’s nodding again before his mind catches up. 

She still has a hand in his hair when her lips find him. He fights to keep the rest of his body as still as possible. 

After a moment, she opens up, letting the kiss deepen. _This is new,_ he thinks.

It goes on for a little while longer before they’re both slowing down, and eventually ends with Nancy kissing him once on the lips, then on the nose.

Jonathan can feel Steve’s leg tensed against his feet. _Shit._

“That’s new,” Jonathan croaks.

Nancy’s sitting up, placing herself in Steve's lap again, and then they’re kissing. 

Jonathan suddenly feels very warm. He tries to force himself to look away, but somehow can’t. It doesn’t help that he knows Steve watched them kiss the whole time. It’s starting to feel like a battle of wills. _Who chickens out first?_

He finally manages it, turning back to find the television off. He suddenly wonders how long he’d been asleep.

Nancy shifts, no longer in Steve’s lap. She drops to the floor, caught between the table and the edge of the couch, suspended somewhere between the two boys. 

“Wow,” she breathes.

Both of them are silent. They’re still touching, Jonathan’s feet against Steve’s thigh. It feels like too much and not enough at the same time, but of what Jonathan’s unsure.

He feels Steve turn towards him. “You okay?” he asks.

Jonathan forces himself to meet his eyes. “Are you?” he asks, both meaning it and sort of a challenge.

Steve grins, “I’m great.”

 _Okay, so everyone’s great, just…great._ He nods, and drops his head back down onto the couch.

“Do you have curfew tonight, Nance?”

“Nope,” she tells him. She turns to Jonathan, “And Will is staying the night at mine, right?”

“Yeah,” he says.

Nancy’s eyebrows lift mischievously. “Sleepover?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> WE HAVE A TITLE
> 
> I REPEAT
> 
> WE HAVE A TITLE


	9. Part IX

Jonathan’s mind is reeling as he and Steve are throwing down pillows and blankets in the living room. 

He says something to fill the silence. “How’s the hand?”

Steve shrugs. “Mostly fine, now.”

“And Tommy hasn’t…retaliated?”

Steve plops down onto the couch. “Not yet,” he says.

Jonathan sits down a safe distance away. “You got him pretty good,” he admits. “I saw him in the hall.”

Steve nods, clenching and unclenching his fist. “Hey,” he says suddenly, “Has he tried to mess with you?”

“Not since…before,” Jonathan says. 

“Good,” Steve says. “If he does, tell me. I told Nancy the same. I won’t put up with him trying to start shit with you two.”

“Do you think he will?”

Steve shakes his head, “I don’t know. He said some…stuff before I hit him. Just keep an eye out, okay?”

“Stuff about me?” Jonathan asked. 

“All of us,” Steve admits. “I’ve made all of us a target, now.”

“I was already a target, man,” Jonathan says. “I’m used to it,” he lies.

Steve frowns. “I’m sorry about everything, man. I would give anything to take it all back.”

Jonathan watches him closely. “It’s fine, now.”

“No, it’s—it’s not fine. What I did was shitty. And now Tommy and Carol have more reasons to go after you. I fucked up.”

“Yeah, you kind of did,” he says, “but it’s fine, now. Look, we’re friends, right?”

Steve looks up at him, hand relaxing. “I hope so,” he says.

Jonathan has the instinct to reach out and take Steve’s hand, like Nancy did with him in the car. He suppresses it. _Not good,_ he thinks.

Nancy interrupts them before either of them can make it more awkward.

“Do we wanna try one more movie?” she asks.

Jonathan shrugs. 

“I already have one in mind,” she tells them.

———

“Another musical?” Steve complains.

“Oh, shut up,” she laughs. “You like Rocky Horror. And you’ll probably fall asleep five minutes in.”

“You’re not wrong,” he shrugs. 

Jonathan’s also expecting to sleep through most of this one. The fatigue of the day is finally catching up with him, the adrenaline rush from kissing already gone.

“Jonathan, you’ll like the music in this one,” Nancy says. “Much more your style.”

He laughs, “What, you think Dolly Parton isn’t my style?”

She smiles. 

They settle in, Steve and Nancy on the couch and Jonathan having volunteered to take the floor. He’d slept on worse, and Steve’s carpet wasn’t terrible. 

He makes sure to leave enough space for them to sneak upstairs without waking him. 

Despite his tiredness, Jonathan finds himself somewhat interested in the movie. 

The music, while still a little too ‘musical’ for him, is definitely better than Dolly Parton. Once they reach the mansion, the movie becomes much more interesting. More colors, more voices, lots of awkwardness.

He thinks he knows why Nancy picked this movie.

This movie is decidedly more racy. It makes him blush quite a bit.

There are several scenes that induce a more…physical reaction, and Jonathan’s glad he’s on the floor, away from easy view.

He does still fall asleep before it’s over. The last thing he remembers is all of them in the pool, dressed unusually and singing sadly.

———

_He wakes and finds Nancy curled against him._

_Her hair tickles his nose and smells sweet. They’re lined up, shoulders to knees, and he has a hand slung over her waist._

_She stirs, pushing back against him. It’s very warm._

_He blinks, and she’s gone. He still feels warm, but her body has left him. He looks up and sees her in much the same position not far from him, but with Steve behind her rather than him._

_She turns her head up, kisses Steve._

_Suddenly, Nancy is back to him. Kissing him. His mind struggles to catch up with his body._

_Something in the air changes. Jonathan feels warm again._

_There’s another body behind Nancy. Steve. She’s nestled between them, kissing back and forth._

_Jonathan is uncomfortably aware of Steve. He moves his hand on Nancy’s hip and then pauses when he realizes it’s not her. His hand is on Steve, branching across the Nancy-sized gap between them._

_Nancy disappears again, but Steve doesn’t. He’s in Jonathan’s space, breathing the same air._

_He’s incredibly warm._

———

When Jonathan really wakes, it takes him a minute to shake the dream out of his head. He can tell that it affected him. Not a lot, but enough. He really, really wishes it hadn’t.

He looks around. He sees somebody still on the couch. He can just barely see Steve’s hair from underneath the mass of blankets. 

Jonathan rolls onto his back. He can hear soft noises through the house, probably in the kitchen. Probably Nancy.

He’s in no rush to get up. He needs his body to relax. He goes to tuck his hands underneath his head and brushes skin.

Steve’s hand, hanging over the edge of the couch, right next to him. 

Jonathan freezes, afraid he’s woken him, but the sleeping form doesn’t move. He exhales, relieved. 

The hand hanging down is the one still healing. Jonathan has seen it plenty, in its many shades, over the last week. The bruising was mostly gone now, only a hint of yellow and green remaining beneath the skin.

He stares at it, trying to clear his head, unworried about being watched himself. 

He can just make out the words to “Science Fiction Double Feature” coming from somewhere in the house. 

_“At the late night, double feature, picture show, I wanna go._  
To the late night, double feature, picture show, in the back row.  
To the late night, double feature, picture show.” 

The hand moves slightly, fingers twitching.

Jonathan hears a groan, and then Steve turns his head toward him.

“Wha’? Time’sit?” he mumbles.

Jonathan doesn’t know.

Steve rubs at his eyes with his other hand, catching a glimpse at his watch. “Ughhh, too early.”

“How early?” Jonathan asks quietly.

“Seven,” Steve slurs. “Saturday. Too early.”

Jonathan laughs at him, and Steve flops his hand in Jonathan’s face. “Sshh,” he says, putting his hand over Jonathan’s mouth. “Quiet.”

Steve hand slips away before Jonathan has time to overthink the contact, but the hand comes to rest just against his forearm, the fingers brushing over the fabric of his shirt.

Jonathan closes his eyes. Any other reaction would take too much effort. 

The humming moves closer, back into the living room, and stops at their feet.

“Good morning,” Nancy says to them. 

Steve makes a noise of dissent. Jonathan hums acknowledgment.

“Sleepy boys,” she coos.

She drops down beside Jonathan, curling up against him, chin on his chest. One of her arms reaches for Steves hand, and she takes it loosely, leaving it touching Jonathan’s arm. 

Steve’s thumb strokes back and forth over the back of Nancy’s hand slowly. With her other hand, she draws lazy patterns against Jonathan’s neck. 

Jonathan suddenly feels like he’s suffocating.

He cannot breathe because of the weight settling on his lungs. A weight that’s familiar, but never been so constrictive.

Not even when Will was taken. 

The amount to which he feels it in this moment is crushing.

Because despite the fact that they’re all right here, Jonathan is more afraid of losing this than anything else in his life.

He cannot name it for fear of making it real.

It terrifies him. He can’t breathe.

“Hey,” he hears. Not Nancy, though she is also watching him, but Steve above him. “Where’d you go?” 

Jonathan shakes his head, lightly jostling Nancy. “I don’t know,” he whispers, his voice breaking. He squeezes his eyes shut, and is unsurprised when hot tears spill over as he does.

It’s quiet for a long time. Eventually, both Nancy and Steve get up and leave the room. He does not open his eyes until they are gone. 

And just for a moment, he feels like himself again.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The Dream Sequence Strikes Back
> 
> THERE'S WAY TOO MUCH DIALOGUE AND I'M SORRY IF ITS SHITTY


	10. Part X

While they leave Jonathan in the living room, Nancy and Steve retreat to the kitchen. Nancy reaches for the wall phone.

She dials home. It rings twice before her mother picks up. She can hear the boys and Holly in the background. _“Hello?”_

“Hi, Mom.”

_“Nancy, honey. How was movie night?”_

“It was good. Hey, do you need me for anything today?”

Her mom pauses. _“No, I don’t think so. Why?”_

“We’re going to spend the day studying. Me, Steve, and Jonathan.”

_“Alright, honey. Don’t get home too late, we have church in the morning.”_

“I know. I’ll be home for dinner. I’ll also call Mrs. Byers about Will. Thanks, Mom. Love you.”

_“Love you, too, Nancy.”_

She replaces the phone in the cradle, then removes it again.

She dials another number.

It rings four times, and picks up just as the fifth ring starts. _“Hello?”_

“Mrs. Byers, hi. It’s Nancy Wheeler.”

There’s a pause. _“Oh, hi, Nancy. What can I do for you?”_

“I was just wondering if Jonathan could stay for a little longer and study with us?”

 _“Of course!”_ Joyce cries. 

“Will is still at my house, and it sounds like everyone’s awake. I don’t know if you mind him staying a little longer or if you wanted to go pick him up. Jonathan will be home before dinner.”

_“Actually, now that you mention it, I wanted to run into town, so I think I will go grab him. Thanks for calling, Nancy.”_

“It’s no problem, Mrs. Byers.”

_“Oh, sweetheart, you can call me Joyce.”_

“I know,” Nancy chuckles. “Bye, Joyce.”

_“Bye, Nancy.”_

She hangs up the phone again, leaving it there.

———

While Nancy’s on the phone, Steve rummages around for something to eat. They’re all overdue breakfast, but the only thing he can find is cereal. 

He pours three bowls, topping them all off with milk, and dropping a spoon into each.

He takes a quick bite of his own before scooping up another and sweeping back into the living room.

By now, Jonathan has mostly recovered and is sitting upright, probably listening to Nancy on the phone with his mom.

He lifts an eyebrow at Steve as he takes the cereal. 

Steve shrugs, sitting back down on the couch.

Nancy returns with her own bowl and sits at the other end of the couch, a decent amount of space between all of them. 

She lazily stirs her cereal. She looks at Jonathan.

“I’m…okay,” he offers, catching her eyes and not entirely lying. 

They continue to eat in silence. It is not so companionable as she hoped. The air is still tense between them. 

Steve looks oblivious to it all, but she knows he’s not. If anything, he’s probably just as good at reading Jonathan as she is. That’s how he knew how to rile him up so easily. 

Had their lives been different, Steve and Jonathan might have found each other without her. The thought sits comfortably in her chest.

Steve finishes first, of course. He puts the bowl down on the table, with a clink of metal against ceramic.

Nancy looks down at her bowl, only half gone. She puts it aside as well, and Jonathan’s follows.

“So,” Steve says. It cuts the tension a little. They all smile.

“So,” Nancy repeats, “I called your mom, Jonathan. She’s going to pick up Will and take him into town. You can stay with us and study, or if you want, you can go home.”

It clicks. She relieved him of his responsibility and also managed to provide him with an empty house should he need it.

He nods, unsure of how to answer quite yet.

“Do you want to talk about it?” Nancy asks.

Steve fidgets. “I can go, if you want,” he offers.

Nancy glances at him, thanks in her eyes. She doesn’t want him to leave, but if it would make things easier, it’s nice that he’s offering.

Jonathan shakes his head, but at what Nancy doesn’t know. _Does he not want to talk? Or does he not want Steve to leave?_

Jonathan folds his legs up and drops his head to his knees. “I don’t know what’s wrong with me,” he says, muffled against his jeans.

“Nothing’s wrong with you,” Nancy argues.

“This is all so…different. Is this what it’s always like?”

“Is what always like this?” Steve asks.

Jonathan pauses. _Love_ , he thinks, but will not say. He shrugs instead, denim brushing his cheek.

“I don’t think this is a good idea,” he murmurs.

Nancy takes a breath. “Why not?” she asks calmly, sounding much more so than she feels.

“I’m not any good at this,” he says. “You guys don’t need me.”

“Now, who told you that?” Steve scoffs.

Jonathan looks up, eyes hard. “Everything would be so much easier for you—for both of you—if I wasn’t in the way.”

Every word from Jonathan looks like it hurts. 

Steve’s hand clenches and unclenches in his lap, his tell for when he wants to do or say something he shouldn’t.

Nancy is trying very, very hard not to cry. 

She slips off the couch onto the floor, but still leaves space between herself and Jonathan. “Look,” she whispers. “I know this is scary. It’s new and it’s strange, but that doesn’t make it bad,” she insists.

Jonathan’s jaw tenses. “It feels wrong to want—” he stops himself.

“Want what?” Nancy asks.

“You,” Steve answers for him. It startles her.

Jonathan laughs sadly. “Yeah, that. And…other stuff.”

“Other stuff?”

“I don’t know how to do this. Having both of you so…right there. It’s kind of freaking me out. It feels wrong.”

“How is it wrong?” Nancy asks.

Jonathan sighs. He sounds so exhausted. Nancy wants to wrap herself in him, in both of them, but she knows it would just make things worse right now.

“Wanting this is wrong because you two are together,” he says. “It was different before. Before there was you two, and then there was me, and that was fine. Now there’s you, and him, and me, and I don’t know what’s right and what’s wrong, and I know that us being friends makes things harder for you guys at school, and it would all just be easier if I left,” he finishes with a breath.

All of the air leaves the room. None of them breathe, move, speak, for what feels like forever.

And then Steve laughs.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> CLIFFHANGER BECAUSE I'M EVIL
> 
> I'm (temporarily?) dropping to one chapter at a time until I have a little more backlog to hold y'all over. I'm currently writing Part 13, so I've already got a couple more before I need to worry, but if I did my normal three-at-a-time then I would have to have finished through 15 by tomorrow and I've slowed down a bit in my writing.
> 
> I'm not done though! I have evil plans for Valentine's! Well, evil and lovely. HAH. 
> 
> And, yes, I did totally ask Siri what day Valentine's was on in 1984 and work my way backwards to figure out where in the timeline they are...no, you're weird. Shut up. (BTW this chapter is Saturday January 28th, in case you were wondering...)


	11. Part XI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 2/11: OMG I forgot to upload yesterday sorry  
> and this one's super short. oops.

Steve laughs. It’s loud and ridiculous and it startles both Nancy and Jonathan.

Nancy looks at him, confused and concerned. “Steve?” she asks.

Jonathan is staring at him in shock, eyes wide and mouth ajar. 

Steve lowers his voice, laughter still there but not as dominating. “That is the biggest load of bullshit I’ve ever heard, Byers.”

Jonathan somehow looks more shocked. Steve thinks it’s hilarious. 

Nancy is still concerned, and starting to get frustrated.

Steve makes himself stop laughing. “No, I’m sorry, it’s just so stupid,” he confesses. 

They both look at him, waiting for an explanation. 

He takes a deep breath. “Okay,” he says. He turns to Nancy. “You want to be with Jonathan?” he asks.

She nods. 

He turns to Jonathan. “And you want to be with Nancy?”

Jonathan starts to say “But—”

“Yes or no, Jonny,” he interrupts. 

Jonathan clamps his mouth shut, and then nods. 

“Okay. Now, do both of you want us all to stay friends?”

Nancy nods. Jonathan hesitates.

“Dude, seriously,” Steve pushes, “you can tell me. I like you, but if you don’t like me, no harm done.”

“I do,” he whispers, “want you. Too.”

Oh. _Oh._ “Oh,” Steve stumbles. “Oh. Okay.”

Jonathan’s eyes are closed again, like he can’t bear to look at Steve. Steve understands.

Nancy is suddenly humming with energy. She looks at Steve. Really looks at him. 

_Say something_ , she’s thinking.

He waits until his heart slows down again, and then drops himself to the floor between them. 

“Now, I’m gonna be honest,” Steve starts, “I was not expecting that.”

Jonathan is stone still before him. Nancy is electric behind him.

“But,” Steve says.

Jonathan shivers. 

“But?” he repeats, looking up slightly, confused.

“I don’t know how all this works either,” Steve tells him. “But I’m willing to try if you are.”

Nancy is suddenly against his back, warm and vibrating. She leans forward, hooking her chin on Steve’s shoulder and reaching for Jonathan’s hair.

They all lean into the contact. Steve’s feet knock against Jonathan’s. Steve reaches for one of Jonathan’s wrists, wrapped around his legs. Jonathan lets him. 

Steve closes his eyes, feels for a pulse, and quietly counts it. It eventually slows to normal, and he opens his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OKAY I'M SO SORRY THIS IS HELLA SHORT
> 
> But I liked where it ended and didn't want to force it to keep going in this chapter.
> 
> The next one will return to normal length (if not a little longer).
> 
> HAVE I MENTIONED HOW MUCH I HATE DIALOGUE LATELY  
> YEAH?  
> WELL IT BEARS REPEATING, I HATE WRITING DIALOGUE


	12. Part XII

Once they finally shake themselves out of whatever they had gotten themselves into, they actually do spend the day studying.

Jonathan decides to take off first, of course.

“Do you need a ride?” he asks quietly.

She shakes her head, and smiles. “I think I’ll stay a little longer.”

He nods. He gathers up his bag and his jacket and heads for the door. Nancy and Steve follow him. Nancy presses a light kiss to his cheek and then lets him flee to his car. She watches and Steve waves from the door.

When the car’s out of sight, Nancy takes Steve’s hand and leads them back inside.

———

They’re in Steve’s bed, which is mostly bare because his bedding is in piles downstairs in the living room. 

He’s drawing circles around her navel. She’s running her hands through his hair.

“I love you,” she says.

He kisses her stomach, then shifts up to meet her eyes. “I love you,” he returns.

“Do you think he…” she trails off.

“Maybe,” Steve answers anyway. “I don’t think _he_ knows yet.”

“And you?”

He shakes his head, hair brushing her face. “I don’t know.”

They’re quiet for a minute. She kisses him once, twice. “Did you mean it?” she asks.

Steve looks at her. “I wouldn’t have said it if I didn’t.”

She nods. “I didn’t know.”

“Me, either,” he laughs softly. “It’s weird.”

“Good weird?”

He kisses her. “Good weird,” he promises.

———

Jonathan barely remembers the drive home. He’s rolling out of Steve’s driveway, blinks, and then he’s sitting in front of his house.

He doesn’t think about it. He goes inside.

“Anyone home?” he calls. No answer.

 _Good_ , he thinks.

He goes straight to his room, drops his bag, pushes of his jacket while kicking off his shoes, and drops into bed.

He doesn’t even bother with music, he just closes his eyes and wills himself asleep.

———

He wakes later, the sky much dimmer out his window, and can hear movement in other parts of the house; the tv chatters, something on the stove pops and sizzles.

He closes his eyes again.

———

The three of them don’t talk again until Monday. Steve picks up Nancy for school, as usual, but neither of them see Jonathan at lunch. At the end of the day, they both end up hovering outside the dark room.

Steve knocks.

“Hang on,” they hear. 

A few moments later, the door swings open and Jonathan emerges.

“Hey,” he says, shrugging his bag onto his shoulder.

They start walking in no particular direction. They end up out by the field, where Steve usually hides out to smoke.

“Where were you at lunch?” Nancy asks.

Jonathan coughs. “Finishing up a project,” he says. She cannot tell if he is lying or not, for once.

Steve picks at a thread from his jeans. 

“We should go out this weekend,” Nancy announces.

The boys look at her. 

“Like, _out_ out. We could go see a movie or go bowling or something.” She sighs.

Jonathan smiles, “I could go for some bowling.”

They both look at Steve. He throws up his hands in surrender. “Okay, but don’t come crying when I score higher than both of you.”

“Oh, you think so?” Nancy argues playfully.

“We’ll see,” Jonathan shrugs. He feels lighter than he has all weekend.

———

When Jonathan comes to pick up Will from the Wheelers’ on Wednesday, Nancy catches him at the door. They stand on the porch pink-cheeked in the cold.

Mike and Will see Nancy slip outside.

“What’s up with them?” Mike asks.

Will shrugs. “They’re friends.” He begins to walk toward the door.

“Are you sure?” Mike asks, suspicious.

“I don’t know,” Will says. 

“Ever since you guys slept over that one time a few weeks ago, Nancy’s been kinda weird,” Mike observes. “Steve hasn’t been over as much, either.”

“So?” Will asks. “Do you think they’re dating?”

“I don’t know,” Mike shrugs. “Steve still picks her up for school in the morning, and she still goes to his house on the weekend.”

“Jonathan goes, too.”

“Teenagers are weird,” Mike says.

Will nods and opens the front door.

Nancy and Jonathan jump apart. The two boys stare, wide-eyed.

Jonathan blushes, Nancy just smiles. “Bye,” she tells him, slipping her hand out of his.

She disappears inside and the boys continue to gape.

“Ready to go?” Jonathan asks, trying not to smile.

———

“Are you and Nancy dating?” Will asks.

Jonathan is surprisingly calm. “No?” he says, but sounds unsure.

“Oh,” Will says. 

“We’re friends,” Jonathan offers.

“Are you friends with Steve?”

This question makes Jonathan hesitate. He takes a deep breath. “Yeah, I am.”

Will looks at him for a minute, then turns back to the windshield. “I’m glad you made friends.”

Jonathan’s heart warms. He throws out a hand and messes with Will’s hair. “I have it on good authority that friends are the best,” he jokes. 

Will giggles.

———

When Mike goes back into the house, Nancy’s already long gone. He climbs the stairs and walks up to her door.

He’s about to knock when it swings open.

“Uh, hi,” he says, fist still in the air.

She rolls her eyes and leaves him at the door, flopping onto her bed. Mike enters slowly and closes the door behind him.

“So,” Mike says.

Nancy sighs.

“Are you dating Jonathan?”

She looks up at him, suspicious.

 _If anyone should be suspicious, it should be me,_ Mike thinks. “No more secrets,” he tells her.

Her expression relaxes slightly. “I don’t know,” she shrugs.

“How do you not know?” Mike asks. “It’s a yes-or-no question.”

“It’s complicated,” she huffs.

“Are you dating Steve, then?”

“Well, yeah,” she admits, “but like I said, it’s complicated.”

“Does Steve know about Jonathan?” 

“Yes,” she answers. 

It’s the first straight answer she’s given him. He has a feeling it’s the only one he’s going to get, at least for now.

“Okay,” he says, tabling the discussion. “Just—just don’t fuck things up with Jonathan. Then Will will never get to come over,” he finishes.

She laughs. “I’m trying not to,” she tells him, staring up at the ceiling.

He leaves her there.

 _Teenagers are so weird_ , he thinks.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Bringing back the boys. Also, more drama. These kids just don't know what they're doing. But they're trying so hard. I love them.
> 
> VALENTINE'S CHAPTER IS GO. It's probably gonna be a long one, which means the one after might be shorter. It might not. I haven't written it yet, lol.
> 
> There was some confusion with the publish dates, but they should all be fixed now. Conveniently, I've somehow stumbled onto posting parts that are concurrent with the date. So the Valentine's chapter will be Part 14, published on the 14th <3
> 
> Share your love in the comments below. I love to read them, and sometimes I even reply!


	13. Part XIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I apologize if this one reads slower than others, it dragged a lot more than usual during writing. I can't tell if it'll be noticeable on y'all's end, so sorry just in case.

On Friday, Nancy has to miss lunch again. Steve takes the opportunity to talk something out with Jonathan.

“So,” he starts.

Jonathan, in the middle of chewing, nods for him to continue.

“Valentine’s Day is coming up,” Steve says.

Jonathan keeps looking at him.

He sighs, “And we should get something for Nancy.”

Jonathan swallows. “Okay?”

“What?” Steve asks.

“Nothing,” Jonathan says quickly. “I’ve just…never…”

“Don’t worry about it,” Steve assures him. “We can just run to town and pick something out.”

Jonathan worries at a fingernail. “Like what?”

“I don’t know. Jewelry, chocolate, anything really.”

“Oh,” Jonathan says, taking another bite of his sandwich.

“But let’s not tell her, alright? It’ll be a surprise.”

Jonathan nods again. “Sure,” he agrees. 

———

That evening, Steve picks up Jonathan and Will before heading to the Wheelers’.

Jonathan lets Will sit up front, and he messes with Steve’s radio the whole ride.

Steve chuckles when he notices. “You and your brother, man. All about your music.”

Will stops when he hears something familiar.

_“This indecision’s bugging me_  
_If you don’t want me, set me free_  
_Exactly whom I’m supposed to be”_

Will freezes, hand on the dial, eyes wide open.

Steve notices before Jonathan. “Hey, little Byers, you all good?” he asks, gaze flicking back between the boy and the road.

Jonathan leans forward. “Will?”

The car jumps, probably running over some pothole in the road. It’s not much, but it shakes Will out of his stupor. “Huh?” he asks.

“You went somewhere else for a minute,” Steve tells him. “You good?”

Will smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes. “Yeah, I’m okay,” he says.

He doesn’t touch the radio again. He stares out the side window the whole rest of the drive.

———

As soon as they pull up, Will launches himself out of the car toward the house. Steve turns off the engine, and looks over his shoulder at Jonathan. “Is he okay?” he asks softly.

Jonathan shrugs. “He’ll be fine. I think that song brings up…weird memories,” he sighs.

Steve nods, and leaves it at that. “Let’s go get our girl,” he says instead, climbing out of the car.

_She’s not ours_ , Jonathan thinks immediately, with a smile. Instead his mind supplies him with, _We’re hers._

———

The bowling alley is busy, but not overcrowded. There are a few people they recognize from classes, but no one any of them know well enough to interact with outside of school hours.

They get their lane, the other side of it conveniently unoccupied. Nancy begins changing shoes when Steve reappears with two bowling balls, one light green and the other dark blue.

“Hey, Nance,” he calls. “Which one brings out my eyes more?”

She looks up. “You’re an idiot, Steve Harrington,” she laughs.

“That’s not very helpful,” he teases.

“The green one,” Jonathan mumbles, without looking up from his shoes.

Steve grins. “Thank you,” he says, tilting his head toward the other boy. “See, Nancy? I’m not a total idiot.” He puts the green one in their ball return.

Jonathan looks up. “I didn’t say that,” he argues. “I just answered your dumb question.”

Steve touches his free hand to his chest, playing affronted. “So rude,” he tells them, “both of you.”

Nancy rolls her eyes, standing and walking past Steve. 

“I’ll take the other one,” Jonathan offers.

“Good,” Steve answers, “because you’re up first, Slugger.”

Jonathan raises his eyebrows and takes the ball held out to him. “I think that’s baseball, Steve.”

Steve dismisses him with a hand.

Nancy returns, red bowling ball in hand. 

“I assume our resident genius would like to handle the scorecard?” Steve asks her.

She puts her ball down and takes the card from him. “Order?” she asks.

“I was thinking alphabetical,” Steve tells her. “Byers, Harrington, Wheeler.”

“How organized,” she teases, already filling in the boxes.

Jonathan smiles, watching them. 

“Okay, Jonathan, you’re up.” Nancy tells him. 

———

Nancy sweeps the first game by nearly twenty points, with Jonathan and Steve only a few points from each other behind her. 

Steve calls for a rematch. Jonathan huffs for a moment, but agrees. Nancy rolls her eyes at them both.

They begin again.

———

After Nancy and Jonathan battle it out for the win, Nancy squeaking by with only five points, the three of them start to take off their shoes.

“This is totally unfair. How did this happen?” Steve laments.

“Beginner’s luck?” Jonathan offers. 

“This wasn’t your first time bowling, was it?” Nancy asks him.

Jonathan hesitates. “No,” he mumbles. “But it’s been a while.”

“I swear, the pins were working against me,” Steve whines. “I totally hit that left one when I got that split, but it barely even wobbled!”

Nancy rolled her eyes, just finishing tying her shoes back on. She takes her own rental shoes, and swipes Steve’s and Jonathan’s, walking off to return them.

When she returns, Steve suddenly says, “I could really go for a milkshake,” pausing in pulling his shoe back on.

Jonathan’s stomach rumbles softly. Steve maybe notices. He can’t really tell.

“A milkshake sounds good,” Nancy grins. 

“Then it’s settled. Milkshakes on me!” he announces.

———

Jonathan lies and says he doesn’t want anything. Nancy offers to split a milkshake with him, and he tentatively agrees. Steve ignores him and orders a side of fries anyway.

“I don’t wanna hear it, Byers,” Steve tells him when he gets a look. Jonathan seems to relax, not looking for a fight and too tired to argue with Steve over french fries. 

Their fries and shakes are out in no time at all, seeing as they seem to be the only people in the diner—unusual for a Friday night, but comfortable. 

Nancy had started sitting in a booth with Steve, but she pushes her way out and joins Jonathan on his side to offer some of her milkshake, and leans warmly into his side.

Once the boys have cleaned out the fries, it’s already just after ten. Nancy yawns, dropping her head onto Jonathan’s shoulder.

“I think Miss Nancy is ready to go home,” Steve teases.

Jonathan nervously lifts an arm around her back, rubbing his hand over her opposite arm. “You want to go?” he asks quietly.

She nods against him. “This was good,” she mumbles tiredly. “We should do this again.”

Jonathan looks up at Steve, raises his eyebrows. Steve smiles. “Yeah, we should,” he says.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hello!
> 
> Tomorrow's chapter is a monster. Like, 4 times the length of a normal chapter. (I try to keep them around 1000 words.) But while I was writing it, I kept finishing one scene and then another and I still wasn't done with Valentine's shenanigans.
> 
> AND keep in mind that I really, truly meant it when I said this fic would be slow-burn for Jonathan and Steve. It's so slow that even I'M getting impatient. But I wanna do it right, goddammit. Ugh. Being a writer sometimes means torturing yourself, too.


	14. Part XIV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Warning: Period-typical homophobia, some slurs, and probably an uncomfortable amount of second-hand embarrassment because these precious weirdos are so awkward it hurts me sometimes.

The weekend passes, and Monday brings them back to school. Steve tracks Jonathan down in the darkroom after school before Nancy shows up and they agree to go shopping for Nancy’s gift Wednesday afternoon.

Nancy raises her eyebrows suspiciously when she finds Steve already in the darkroom, but she doesn’t say anything. She seems pleasantly surprised by it, in any case, and doesn’t stop smiling even after Steve makes an excuse to leave. 

———

On Wednesday, Jonathan drives Nancy home as usual and then drives over to Steve’s. When he climbs in Jonathan’s car, he seems frustrated.

“What’s up?” Jonathan asks. He half-expects Steve to tell him to shut up, but the other boy takes a deep breath, trying to calm himself, and shakes his head when it doesn’t work.

“My parents are going to be home this weekend, and they’re insisting that we drive out to Indianapolis for some thing. They want to leave Friday,” he sighs.

“So?”

Steve huffs a laugh. “No movie night. And since Valentine’s is on Tuesday, no chance to see Nancy on the weekend. At least, not for me. You guys will still see each other, obviously.”

Jonathan shrugs. “If she wants to,” he says.

Steve turns to him abruptly. “Dude, you don’t need me to be there to hang out with her. Have movie night at your place,” he says. 

Jonathan hesitates, already instinctively making excuses. “I don’t know, Steve—”

Then there’s a hand on his shoulder. “Don’t worry about it, dude, I got it. I’ll take care of everything before I leave.”

Jonathan forces himself to relax at the contact, and it takes surprisingly less effort than expected. He can tell Steve isn’t going to let this go, so he just says, “Yeah, okay.”

Steve smiles. “Thanks, man.” 

———

They end up at the department store. Steve keeps glancing at the jewelry counters, but he can tell that it makes Jonathan uncomfortable, so they wander through the rest of the store first.

“What does Nancy even like?” Steve huffs after the first fruitless half hour.

“I should be asking you,” Jonathan jokes. “You’re the boyfriend.”

Steve throws him a look. He pretends not to notice.

They stumble across a display full of red and pink, clearly set up for the holiday, and it features various items from stuffed animals to chocolate to gimmicky cards. Steve picks up a pink bear, with the words “Be Mine” stitched across the stomach.

He holds it in front of his face, and raises his voice a little. 

“Help me, Jonny. I need to escape this place!”

Jonathan blushes, chuckles softly. He shakes his head. “That’s just weird,” he says.

Steve turns the bear towards him, eyes widening. “You’re right. Creepy.” He puts it back.

They keep walking, and despite Jonathan being the one to lead for a while they end up back at the jewelry counters. 

Steve looks at him. 

“I know you want to look,” he sighs, “so go look.”

“We don’t have to,” Steve tells him.

“I can’t,” Jonathan shrugs, “but you can. It’s okay.”

Steve still hesitates. “Are you sure?” 

Money was a tricky subject for them.

Jonathan nods. “I found something for her already, anyway.”

Steve laughs. “Okay,” he agrees, and goes up to the glass cases.

Jonathan follows.

———

They leave the store, Steve having spent more on a necklace than Jonathan’s last paycheck was. Jonathan is surprisingly aloof about it, considering.

“I need to run down the street,” Jonathan tells him as they walk out the front doors. 

Steve nods, tucking his hands into his jacket pockets. “I’m in no rush,” he grins.

There’s a small camera and film shop in Hawkins. Nothing spectacular, but better than not having one.

Jonathan goes inside, Steve following. He does not mention that this is where he bought Jonathan’s camera. 

But apparently he doesn’t have to. The clerk recognizes him.

“Hey, kid. You been in here before?” he asks Steve.

Jonathan looks back at him, eyebrows raised.

“Yeah, I came in back in December,” Steve reminds him, avoiding Jonathan’s gaze.

“Oh, right, you came in looking for that MX SLR. How’s it working out?”

He looks down. “Yeah, Jonathan, how is it?”

Jonathan nods slowly. “It’s great,” he mumbles, then turns around and walks away.

Steve follows a few extra steps behind him. 

Jonathan had kind of guessed that Steve had paid for the camera. But he had assumed Nancy had probably had something to do with it. The way Steve reacted to the clerk’s interest implied he had sought it out on his own. Jonathan didn’t know what to do with this information.

He found the film he was looking for, and returned to the counter. “Just this,” he says.

The cashier rings him up. “That camera’s a beaut, ain’t she?”

Jonathan smiles nervously, pulling money carefully out of his wallet. “Yeah,” he agrees. 

He hands over the film in a paper bag. “Have a good day, boys.”

“Thanks,” they say, and leave.

———

The ride back to Steve’s is quiet. 

But, of course, it can only stay that way for so long when Steve Harrington’s involved. “Are we gonna talk about this or would you rather not?”

There’s a long pause.

“Thank you,” Jonathan says.

Steve smiles.

“That’s kind of all I got,” Jonathan shrugs.

“It’s…good. Great,” Steve tells him. “So it’s a good one, right?”

Jonathan nods. “Even better than the last one,” he admits. “I bought that one off some guy who didn’t care enough about it to ask for the full value. I think he’d gotten it as a gift or something.”

“Huh.”

They pull into the driveway.

“See you tomorrow, I guess,” Jonathan says.

Steve smiles. “Tomorrow.”

———

The next day, everything goes to shit.

When Steve and Nancy get to school, they can see some people in the parking lot looking at them too long.

Inside, it gets worse. The other kids are whispering, now. Nancy takes Steve’s hand as they walk, squeezing it.

He squeezes back.

They turn into the hallway and a flash of red catches their eyes. 

_WHORE_

_QUEER_

_FAGGOT_

Painted across their lockers. All of them. Nancy, Steve, and Jonathan. 

At the end of the hall, Steve sees them. Tommy and Carol, not even hiding their shit-eating grins. Too proud of their handiwork.

Nancy spots them too, squeezes his hand again. 

The paint across Jonathan’s locker is smudged, fingerprints through the G and T near the lock.

“Jonathan,” she whispers.

He sighs. “I know,” he answers.

And so they go looking.

———

They don’t find him in the darkroom, but the paint on the doorknob and the bottom of the sink gives away that he had been there.

They keep looking, long after the bell rings for class to start.

They find him out by the football field. 

Whether he doesn’t notice them or doesn’t care, he’s still as they approach. 

Nancy lets go of Steve’s hand and goes to him, leaning against his back and wrapping her arms around him. He lets her, or at least doesn’t fight it.

Steve sits down across from them. 

They stay there for a long time, not saying anything.

They go back inside around lunchtime. A secretary immediately spots them and pulls them into the office.

Twenty minutes later, they’re sent back to class, left to finish the day and then they all go home right after school.

———

Jonathan calls Nancy Thursday night to tell her he won’t be at school the next day. She agrees to pick up homework from his teachers for him if he’ll come get her after school. He agrees to meet her in the parking lot.

Steve drives her to school Friday morning despite not planning on going himself. He tells Nancy about his parents, the trip to Indianapolis. He tells her that she’s supposed to go to Jonathan’s Saturday evening. He promises to see her Monday morning.

He kisses her for a long time before she gets out of the car. He tells her to skip lunch, stay away from anywhere Tommy and Carol could corner her. He doesn’t actually think they’d go after her, at least not so soon, but he worries anyway.

She listens patiently, kisses him back, and then goes to class. During lunch, she gathers Jonathan’s schoolwork. 

Their lockers have been scrubbed half-heartedly, the words mostly gone but smudges of red paint remaining.

Jonathan’s in his car waiting for her as soon as the bell rings for school’s end.

———

“Steve says I’m supposed to go to your house tomorrow?” Nancy asks him, sitting in the car outside her house. 

Jonathan manages a chuckle. “Yeah, he apparently called my mom. She’s not very good at secrets. You don’t have to come if you don’t want to,” he offers. 

“I want to,” she tells him. 

He pauses, looking away from her, and then nods. 

“Are you okay?” she asks.

“Just—” he starts, “I don’t know. Thinking?”

She nods. “Yeah,” she murmurs. Her mouth is turned down in a frown, and she twists her fingers together.

“Hey,” Jonathan says. 

She looks up.

“We’re going to be okay, yeah?”

She smiles sadly. “Yeah,” she says, unsure of whether or not she believes it. She wants to.

He’s close, very close, but makes no move to close the gap. Always afraid her mind has changed.

_I have to do all the work,_ she thinks to herself with a smile. And she kisses him.

———

Saturday evening, there’s a knock on Jonathan’s bedroom door. “Jon?” his mother calls.

“Yeah,” he responds.

The door opens. She approaches slowly, and plants herself on the corner of his bed. “How are you?” she asks.

He shrugs.

She knew about the lockers. So did Nancy’s parents, and probably also Steve’s. After they were pulled into the principal’s office, he had surely called their homes. He assured them that the school was doing everything to try and find out who was responsible.

He knew nothing would come of it, and he honestly didn’t care. He was ready to forget it ever happened.

“Okay,” she says. “Is Nancy coming over?”

Jonathan looks at his hands in his lap. He resists the urge to pick at his nailbeds. “She said she wanted to,” he provides.

“Good,” Joyce tells him. “Well, you won’t have to worry about your brother after you drop him off, and I’ll be at work if you need me,” she rambles, standing.

She looks at him hard. “You know I love you, right?”

“I know, Mom,” he says. “Thanks.”

As she’s walking out, she can hear him mumble, “I love you too.” She closes the door behind her.

———

Jonathan walks Will to the door of the Wheelers’, feeling a little guilty about having hidden in his car the last few times he had come by.

Nancy answers the door. “Come on in,” she says.

They do, Will quickly disappearing into the basement with the other boys and Nancy upstairs. Mrs. Wheeler calls to him from the kitchen. “Hello, Jonathan!”

“Hi, Mrs. Wheeler,” he replies, hanging awkwardly in the doorway.

“How’s your mom?” she asks.

“Good,” Jonathan says. He remembers how out of it his mom had been before, knows that’s what Mrs. Wheeler’s really asking about. “Doing a lot better,” he adds, the _since Will came back_ silently implied.

“Well, tell her I said hello,” she says with a polite smile. 

“I will.”

Nancy reappears. “Ready?” she asks him. 

He nods.

“Bye, Mom!” Nancy says, pulling on his arm gently.

“Bye, Mrs. Wheeler,” he adds before stumbling after her.

“Have fun!” they hear, followed by some incoherent babbling from Holly, as they walk out the door.

Jonathan stops on the porch.

“Is your mom okay with you hanging out with me?” he asks, tucking his hands into his jacket.

Nancy smiles. “Yes,” she says. 

He pauses. “Does she…?”

Nancy giggles. “I haven’t told her _everything_ , but I think she gets it,” she says. “She’s trying,” Nancy finishes. _That’s what matters._ She grabs his arm again. “Let’s go,” she tells him. 

———

Nancy has not been inside the Byers home since they fought the monster. Being inside again makes her…nervous. Not enough to leave, though. If Jonathan can still live here after that night, if all of them can, then she should be able to make it through a night without trying.

Doesn’t mean her body agrees with her, though.

She seems fine as they enter the living room, but she glances down the hall toward the bedrooms and sees a little bit of burned carpet peeking out from under a floor rug, probably put there to cover the mark up.

She inhales sharply.

Jonathan notices. He looks at her seriously. “We can go,” he says.

“No,” she says. “I want to be here. I just need a minute.”

He nods hesitantly, still watching her closely. 

She takes another step toward the hallway. “Can I…?”

He shrugs.

She walks right up to the edge of the rug, leans down, slips her fingers under it and lifts. 

It doesn’t look at bad as she remembers it, but maybe that’s because there’s not a bloody bear trap on top of the angry black marks anymore. 

She sighs, and pulls the rug back into place, making the mark disappear below it before standing again.

She returns to Jonathan’s side, sliding her hand inside of his. “Are you okay?” she asks.

He looks at her, manages a small smile. “Yeah,” he says. “You?”

She smiles back. “I’m okay. Show me your room,” she suggests.

———

After the short, somewhat awkward interlude to Jonathan’s room, they return to the living room and Nancy settles on the couch. Jonathan turns on the tv, neither of them really wanting to watch anything but needing something on in the background regardless.

When Jonathan sits beside her on the couch, she shifts closer and drapes her legs over his. 

“Is this okay?”

“Yeah.”

They don’t talk, not really. He holds her hands like they’re something precious and fragile. She watches the minute changes in his facial expressions, wondering what he’s thinking. There are occasional murmurs and whispers when necessary. 

She leans in to kiss him. He lets her for a little while, then leans back some. “This feels weird,” he whispers.

“Why?”

“It feels different,” he sighs.

“Without Steve?” she supplies.

She takes his hesitation as a confirmation. “What happened at school,” he says, “it feels like my fault.”

She shakes her head, forehead brushing his. “It’s not,” she tells him. “Tommy and Carol would find ways to torture us no matter if we’re together or not. That’s who they are.”

“But none of this would’ve happened if…if I hadn’t taken those pictures.”

She lets out a sharp laugh. “There’s many things that wouldn’t have happened if that were the case, and I would say this is the least of our problems.”

“But you, you lost…”

“And I wouldn’t have known why if you hadn’t showed me. We wouldn’t have hurt it if we hadn’t worked together. Don’t ever regret that,” she whispers.

“I’m sorry,” he says.

She shakes her head again. “You don’t have to say that anymore.”

He kisses her. She kisses back. It feels right.

———

There’s a knock at the front door. They both look up, confused. He gets up and goes to the door cautiously.

It’s a pizza.

“Here you go,” the pizza guy says, handing it to Jonathan. “It’s already been covered. Have a good night!”

Jonathan watches him go, and then closes the door. He looks at Nancy. Nancy is smiling into her hands.

He smirks, carries the box to the table, and opens it.

“Oh my god,” he groans. “He didn’t.”

“What?” she asks, getting up to look.

The pepperoni has been arranged on the pizza to make a heart.

She stares, unable to say anything.

“I’m gonna kill him,” Jonathan mumbles, not sounding like he means it at all. 

———

Half a pizza and a bad tv movie later, Jonathan and Nancy are half-asleep on the couch. 

She starts to wake up a little, not entirely comfortable on the couch.

“Jonathan,” she murmurs.

He shifts. “Hmm?”

“Can we go to sleep?”

He blinks tiredly. “Huh?”

“Let’s go lay down. This isn’t very comfortable,” she confesses.

He’s quiet for a long time. “Okay,” he says finally.

As she leads him by the hand back to his bedroom, he stops her and she turns.

“I should take you home.”

She keeps pulling him along.

They crawl into his bed, Nancy pulling the duvet over them and curling up against his side.

“Nancy,” he whispers.

She shakes her head against his chest. “Sleep,” she orders. 

He’s tired and warm, but very aware of the fact that they are alone in the house, in bed, very close. This seems like too much.

He sits up. “We shouldn’t do this,” he says. “I should take you home.”

“I don’t want to go home yet.”

“Don’t you have a curfew?”

She shakes her head again. She tugs on his shirt, wanting him to lay back down.

He does, but his body remains tense and stiff. “We shouldn’t,” he repeats, quieter.

She sighs, frustrated. “Shut up,” she mumbles, and kisses him to do just that.

This only makes him tense up more, even as his body pulls her in further. “We can’t,” he breathes. “Nancy, I can’t.”

She stops, looks at him, and nods. “Can we just sleep, please?” she asks.

He nods mutely, still breathing quickly.

She turns away from him and pulls his arm over herself. “Sleep,” she whispers one last time, closing her eyes.

It takes him a minute to relax into it, but he does. And eventually, they sleep.

———

Nancy wakes, the other body warm at her back.

It is still dark outside. She hadn’t actually talked to her mother about when she was coming home, let along that she would stay the night, but in this moment she didn’t care. 

She felt an ache in her chest for Steve, but it was soothed when she turned around in Jonathan’s arms and his hold tightened unconsciously around her. 

She looks at his face, more relaxed in sleep than she’s ever seen it when he’s awake. She wishes he could accept this, accept them, and not constantly worry that she’s going to walk away. That none of them want to walk away from this.

She knows Jonathan hasn’t had many friends before, and that often he’s been kicked to the absolute edges of social circles for most of his life. Her heart hurts whenever he doubts their friendship, their relationship, because she knows no one else has come this close before.

She and Steve had managed to break through the first few barriers of Jonathan Byers, and she had no intention of stopping until they had broken them all. She wanted Jonathan to be as secure in this as she was, as Steve would be eventually. 

She had never doubted that she wanted them both. She had only ever worried about how they would react to that. About whether or not they would want her back, and whether they would be willing to be a little flexible.

It made her feel indescribably happy when she realized they might want to be with each other, as well. That the three of them could possibly be together, no barriers, no lines in the sand, no negotiating. Just… _love_. She hoped.

She reached up to brush a lock of hair out of Jonathan’s eyes, and found her fingers tracing the lines of his face.

He began to stir, slowly.

She stilled her hand along his jaw, waiting for him to rouse.

His eyes open, he blinks a few times, and then looks at her. “Hey.”

“Hi.”

“What time is it?”

She glances at her watch. “Four-thirty.”

He groans, voice cracking. She smiles at him.

He is vaguely aware that his mother may very well be home. He doubts it, but it’s still a possibility.

“I should take you home,” he mumbles.

Nancy sighs. “Stop saying that. I’ll tell you when I want to go home,” she scolds.

There’s a moment where they just stare at each other in the dark.

“What are we doing?” he asks.

“Whatever we want,” she answers.

Nancy can tell that his brow furrows at this, but he doesn’t say anything.

She moves her leg forward experimentally. His pulse picks up, but he doesn’t stop her. She moves in closer, their faces just centimeters apart. His hands on her waist are heavy but still loose.

“Tell me if you want to stop,” she whispers against his lips.

When he doesn’t, she kisses him. 

It begins lazily, both of them still just waking, but it shifts into something else, something warmer and more urgent.

Nancy is pulling herself closer, or trying, as they’re already flush against each other. 

She pushes on, opening their mouths and progressing the kiss. 

His hands tighten on her waist.

She shifts her weight so that she’s on top of him, essentially straddling him while kissing.

He inhales sharply against her mouth. She leans her forehead on his, takes a moment to breathe.

She locks eyes with him for a moment. _Tell me if you want to stop._

Once he gets the message, she leans up a bit.

He watches her, eyes hazy.

She rolls her hips experimentally, just a little. 

He inhales again, hands tight around her waist, and pulls her back down into a kiss.

Before she can try again, he’s rolled her off his lap and back down onto the bed beside him.

“Too much?” she breathes, when they break for air.

He nods, not trusting his voice.

“Someday,” she tells him. It sounds like a promise. It lights him on fire.

It takes all of his concentration to continue kissing her slowly while trying to calm himself down.

Eventually they stop, and fall back asleep.

———

When Jonathan wakes again, there is a small sliver of light coming through his window. Nancy is no longer tucked up against him.

He sits up, needing to find her.

She’s laying on the couch in the living room. Not only that, but her head is in his mother’s lap, who is carefully brushing her fingers through Nancy's hair as they whisper to each other.

He has no idea what to do with the scene in front of him. His heart is racing already.

Nancy notices him first, turning toward him. His mother also looks up, a nervous smile on her face.

After awkwardly staring at them for another minute, Jonathan’s shoulders sag and he approaches the women, taking a seat on the floor just beside his mother. He drops his head onto the edge of the couch cushion and closes his eyes, focuses on breathing normally.

The women begin to chatter again, talking about him and Nancy and Steve and also Will and her mother and several other topics he’s only barely following. 

And just like that, his mother has accepted Nancy into their life, their home, their family. It feels right. It terrifies him.

He anxiously dreads whenever she decides to do the same with Steve.

———

He takes Nancy home after Joyce makes them both breakfast. He is uncomfortably giddy the whole time. When they get to the Wheelers’, Mrs. Wheeler also offers him breakfast. He politely declines, but lets Will finish. Nancy kisses him on the porch as they’re leaving, promising to see him tomorrow.

Will’s cheeks go a little pink when his brother comes back to the car.

———

Nancy calls Steve’s house Sunday evening. Surprisingly, there’s an answer.

_“Hello?”_ an older man answers.

“Oh, hello. I’m calling for Steve?” she stumbles.

_“Who’s this?”_ he asks.

“Nancy,” she replies.

There’s a long pause, with a little bit of static in the background.

_“Nancy?”_ Steve answers.

“Hi,” she says. “I didn’t know when you would be back.”

_“We just got in, kind of.”_

“Oh,” she breathes. “Have fun?”

He chuckles. _“Not really. You?”_

She blushes. “Yeah. Missed you, though.”

_“I missed you, too.”_ There’s an unspoken _Both of you._

“I don’t really know why I called,” she admits. “I didn’t really expect anyone to pick up.”

_“That’s okay.”_

“I’ll let you go. See you in the morning?”

_“It’s a date,”_ he tells her. _“Goodnight, Nancy.”_

“Goodnight, Steve.”

———

Steve picks her up Monday morning. They spend a half hour parked at the back of the school lot, kissing, talking about their weekends.

Nancy doesn’t know what to tell Steve and what not to tell. “Is this weird for you?” she asks.

He kisses her again. “Not really. I kind of want to know,” he admits.

She nods, tells him the important bits. Tells him about sleeping over, about waking up and Joyce finding her. 

There’s a long moment of quiet.

“I want to ask you something,” Nancy says. “But I don’t want you to freak out.”

Steve shakes his head, brushing her with his hair. “I won’t.”

“Are you attracted to Jonathan?”

Steve stills for a moment, then takes a deep breath. “Maybe,” he whispers. “I don’t know.”

“Okay, now I have another weird question.”

He huffs a laugh. “Yeah?”

“Do you have a problem with me sleeping with Jonathan?”

_Not really sleeping_ , he knows. 

“I do not,” he says, and in that moment he finally believes it. He had been doubting himself, doubting her, but as soon as he put it out there it didn’t matter anymore. “Does he have a problem with you sleeping with me?”

Nancy looks away. “I don’t know if he knows,” she whispers. “But he’s not—we’re not ready for that yet. You and I already have that.”

Steve swallows. “You should probably ask him, too, then?”

“Not yet,” she says. “I think he’s still unsure about the whole thing. Thinks we’re going to change our minds, walk away. I don’t know how to make him trust us.”

“It’ll happen,” he assures her. “It might be slow, but it’ll happen. We just have to be patient.”

———

Monday is surprisingly uneventful, with a quiet tension hiding beneath. 

Tuesday is a hurricane of red and pink, overwhelming and unavoidable. Steve gives Nancy her necklace before school, and she wears it all day.

Jonathan hands her a large flat paper bag at lunch. Out of it slides multiple photos, various ones of her, her and Steve, some she’s seen before and some she hasn’t. She flips through them slowly. The one at the very back of the pile is one she’s never seen before.

It’s the three of them, in Nancy’s living room. All of them asleep, Nancy on the couch and the boys on the floor, leaned up against it. She’s got a hand on both of them. The photo is very dark, taken in low light with no flash, and a little blurry. But it’s beautiful.

She looks up at Jonathan. “I found that in one of my film rolls. I don’t know who took it. It must have been one of the boys,” he shrugs.

“It’s amazing,” she whispers, her eyes glistening. “Thank you.”

He half-turns to Steve, who’s looking at the photo over Nancy’s shoulder. “I have more, if you want one.” Steve smiles back at him.

Nancy takes one more look at the photo, slides the stack carefully back into the bag, and then stands and walks around to Jonathan’s side of the table. She sits down beside him and pulls him into a hug.

In that moment, none of them care that they’re in the middle of the cafeteria. For that moment, it is just the three of them, Nancy and Jonathan embracing and Steve looking at them fondly, his heart tight in his chest.

In that moment, they all feel so incredibly loved.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY COW.
> 
> Okay. Now that that's done, I might be slowing down a bit. I'm not done by any means, but my writing has slowed down quite a lot and I don't want to have to force myself to write something half-assed. 
> 
> I don't know how frequently this story will update in the future, and for that I apologize. I loved this whirlwind week with you guys, but school and real life are demanding my attention once again. 
> 
> THIS STORY IS NOT OVER. It just won't update daily anymore. Hmu in the comments if you need me. I'll see you guys soon!


	15. Part XV

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> OMG I'M BACK
> 
> AND 20K HOLY MOLY

Nancy is doing her homework Wednesday night when she hears light tapping at her window. She turns and is unsurprised to find Steve looking in, a smirk playing at his lips.

She puts her pencil down and closes the textbook, then rises from her bed and goes to the window. She lifts and as soon as he’s clear of the glass, he’s already pushing his way in. 

“Hello to you, too,” she teases. 

“Hey. Sorry. It’s freezing out there.” He shuts the window behind him with a click and turns back to Nancy, gently cradling her face and peppering her with kisses. 

“Why didn’t you use the door like a normal person?” she whispers, as soon as her mouth is free.

Steve chuckles softly, dropping another kiss by her mouth. “I feel like we haven’t been alone in ages. I just wanted to see you.”

She says “I’m studying,” but she’s leaning into him, warming him up with her proximity.

“That’s okay,” he says. “I just wanted to be here for a little bit. Is that okay?”

She smiles. “Yeah.”

———

Steve mostly lounges at the end of her bed, watching her work. But about a half-hour later, she’s finishing up and then crawling back into bed, pulling him up with her.

“I missed you this weekend,” he says.

“Mmm,” she hums, hands in his hair and warm breath on his face.

“But you had a good time with Jonathan, right?”

She nods, nuzzling her nose into his jaw. “Yeah. But we missed you,” she murmurs, lips against his neck.

“Really, now?” he teases.

She pulls back. “Of course,” she says, her eyes dilated and warm, but still serious. 

“Hey,” he says softly, hand smoothing over her cheek. “You know you don’t have to hold back when I’m not there, right?”

She smiles. “I know. But Jonathan doesn’t,” she sighs.

“Well, that’ll have to change,” Steve says.

Nancy locks eyes with him. “You know the same goes for you, right?”

He laughs. “We’ve already proven that, haven’t we?” he chuckles.

“No, I mean,” she mumbles, “with him. If that’s what you want.”

Steve exhales shakily. “Oh.”

She starts pressing her lips to his once again. “I see the way you look at each other when you think no one can see you,” she says, leaning up into him.

Steve doesn’t respond, doesn’t know how to. He focuses on the feel of Nancy against him, but his mind keeps wandering—to Jonathan, to all three of them, to the ‘good-weird’ feeling he gets when they’re all together. 

Things grow heated, and eventually they find themselves stripping down, and crawling under the covers. 

“I love you,” he whispers, gently kissing down her stomach.

She smiles down at him. “I know.”

———

Steve accidentally sleeps over, both of them having fallen asleep after. 

He wakes first, Nancy in his arms, sunlight slowly filtering through her window.

He kisses the back of her neck and starts to pull himself out of the bed.

He thinks he’s done it without waking her, but he pulls on his jeans and turns to find her watching him fondly. “Sneaking out?” she teases.

“Of course not, babe,” he says, leaning back down to kiss her. “Sorry, I didn’t mean to fall asleep here.”

“It’s okay,” she shrugs. “I like sleeping with someone else in the bed with me.”

“Good.” He smiles, dropping one last kiss to her nose before standing again and finding the rest of his clothes. 

“Am I coming back to pick you up?” he asks, heading back toward the window.

“Of course,” she chuckles, “how else would I get to school?”

Steve teases, “Um, I thought you had another devoted boyfriend who also drives. Or did I imagine that?”

“Oh, he only does afternoons. I think he drives someone else in the mornings. Either another girlfriend or his little brother, I can’t remember.”

Steve barks a laugh, but quickly covers his hand with his mouth. “I should go,” he says, still laughing a little.

“Yeah, you should,” she says, standing and ushering him toward the window. “We do not need my mom to come up here and find you.”

He slides open the window and starts to climb out, until he feels a hand on his shoulder.

He turns, and Nancy kisses him, long and slow.

“I love you,” she says.

He kisses her one last time and smiles. “I know.”

———

“So, how did movie night go?” Steve asks him. They’re sitting out by the field, waiting for Nancy.

Jonathan avoids his eye. “Fine,” he shrugs.

“I’m hope the pizza did not disappoint,” he smirks, taking a drag off his cigarette. 

Jonathan chuckles softly. “Idiot,” he murmurs.

Steve presses a little harder. “Did you guys watch anything good?” 

The smile falls again. “Not really,” Jonathan says. “Just TV, you know.”

Steve watches him closely, takes another drag, and then nods. He breathes out smoke.

“You want one?” he offers, suddenly.

Jonathan looks up. “No, I’m okay.”

Steve laughs. “Probably better off,” he sighs, “Nancy’s not the biggest fan. I’ll be off them by summer, I’m sure.”

Jonathan fidgets, hands buried in his jacket. 

“Okay, I know that you don’t like to talk about this stuff, but I feel like it’ll make things worse if we don’t, yeah?”

Jonathan hesitates, then concedes a nod.

“Okay,” Steve sighs, stubbing out his cigarette and shifting his weight forward a bit. “You don’t have to hold back with Nancy, at least not on my account.”

A blush creeps slowly over his cheeks. “I know,” he says. “That’s not what happened.”

Steve waits to see if Jonathan’s going to explain. He doesn’t.

“Okay,” Steve says again, softer now. “I figured it might be weird because we’re…well, we’ve already crossed that bridge.” 

“Why are we talking about this?” Jonathan asks, avoiding his eyes again.

“Because that’s how this works, dude. I’m not keen on it, either, but if we don’t things will get even weirder.”

“I don’t think anything could be weirder than this conversation,” Jonathan mumbles.

“Oh, I don’t know,” Steve teases, “I could think of a couple things.” He lifts his eyebrows.

Jonathan’s blush deepens. “Oh,” he whispers.

Steve likes Jonathan blushing. Steve wants to move closer. He wants to invade Jonathan’s space. He wants to make him blush some more. He doesn’t actually know how he’d do that, though.

And he knows that it’s probably not a good idea.

“Let’s go,” Steve decides. He stands first, and offers his hand to Jonathan.

The other boy takes it, pulling himself up to Steve’s level. Off balance, he teeters into Steve, who puts out his other hand to catch him.

 _Ask and you shall…_ Steve thinks.

“You okay?” he asks Jonathan.

Jonathan nods, and his hair brushes Steve’s face. “Sorry,” he says, but neither of them have moved yet.

“Hey,” a third voice says.

They jump apart, but it’s only Nancy. “Sorry,” she says, “didn’t mean to scare you.”

Steve recovers quickly, swinging a loose arm over Jonathan’s shoulder and pulling him toward Nancy, who he sweeps up in his other arm. “Let’s ride,” he grins.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I KNOW, I KNOW. I'm ridiculous.
> 
> Wow. Okay. Sorry about the two-month disappearance. The muse and I had opposing schedules. But, for the last few days or so, we've found some time together, and here we are!
> 
> Again, I'm posting one chapter at a time. It may be daily, it may not. I SUCK AT CONSISTENCY. But I have written ahead a bit, so we should have at least 3-4 chapters before I go all Houdini again. (I'm also back to original chapter lengths, ~1000 words.)
> 
> I missed my babs. I'm coming to terms with this story primarily being in Steve and Jon's POV; but, to be fair, their relationships needed the most work. AND WE'RE (sort-of) MAKING PROGRESS. 
> 
> I read a few Steve/Jonathan fics for inspiration since I've read everything of consequence in the OT3 tag. Some of those stories are not nice to Nancy. Some of them are. I prefer the ones where she's around and playing matchmaker, regardless of whether she's part of the relationship tbh. LET NANCY LOVE AND CARE FOR HER BOYS.
> 
> Okay, I'm going to stop now. But I'll see you very soon! <3


	16. Part XVI

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> "Because it's _pizza_."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> STUFF AND THINGS. AND MORE THINGS. (Stranger things? Lol.)

They go to Steve’s and pile up around his kitchen table with schoolwork. Nancy and Jonathan both work quietly, but Steve regularly complains.

“I’m hungry,” he announces. “You guys want pizza?”

Nancy looks up. “I feel like we eat pizza a lot,” she says.

“Because it’s _pizza_ ,” Steve insists.

“Can I have a sandwich?” she asks, instead.

Steve scoffs, but gets up to go to the fridge. “Jonny?”

Jonathan looks up, confused. “Huh?”

“Sandwich?” Steve offers.

Jonathan shrugs, quickly turning back to his textbook. Steve pulls out enough for three sandwiches.

“Actually, can I get mine to go? My mom will be here any minute,” Nancy says, glancing at her watch.

“Why?” Steve asks.

“She wanted to go shopping,” Nancy answers, clearing up her books.

“Ah,” Steve nods.

As she’s finishing packing up her stuff, a car horn sounds from outside. “That’ll be her.”

She goes to Steve first, taking the offered sandwich wrapped in a napkin, and going up on her toes to kiss Steve. “Bye,” she tells him.

She passes by Jonathan, still at the table. Drops a kiss to his cheek. 

He looks up at her, eyebrows raised, but she’s already sweeping out to the door.

Jonathan turns to Steve. “Where’d she go?” he asks.

Steve rolls his eyes. “I swear, Byers, sometimes you completely disappear on us,” he says fondly.

Jonathan shrugs and goes back to his book.

Steve finishes their sandwiches and brings them to the table, carefully putting Jonathan’s plate underneath his lowered head.

He jumps, startled, but recovers quickly. “Thanks,” he says.

Steve grabs for his attention while he has it. “Are we back on for Friday movie night?” he asks, taking a bite of his sandwich. 

Jonathan, picking a little at the edge of his own, shrugs. “I don’t have other plans,” he says.

Steve nods. “Got any suggestions?”

“I hear ‘The Thing’ is pretty good.”

“Sounds weird,” Steve says with a smile. “Perfect.”

———

“Is that the Byers’ car?” her mom asks as she climbs in the door, sandwich in one hand and bookbag in the other. Holly is burbling in the backseat.

“Yeah, Jonathan drove me over to do some homework.”

“How’s he doing?”

“Good, I think,” Nancy says.

“And he and Steve are friends now?” her mother asks cautiously.

“Yeah,” Nancy answers, “They figured it out.”

Her mom nods, shifting the car into reverse.

Once they’re back on the main road, her mother starts to fidget her hands on the wheel. “And how’s Steve?”

“He’s great, Mom. Are you okay?”

Oh, I’m fine,” her mother insists. “Absolutely fine.”

“You’re acting a little weird,” Nancy tells her.

Her mother tightens her grip minutely. Nancy notices. 

“It’s nothing, really,” Karen Wheeler says. “You’ve just been spending a lot of time with the two of them, lately.”

“We’re friends,” Nancy says, but casually.

“Just friends?” her mother asks nervously.

Nancy hesitates. “What do you want me to say, Mom?” she asks softly.

“The truth,” she says. “No judgment. You can trust me, Nancy. I only want you to be safe and happy.”

“I am,” Nancy says, smiling to herself. “We’re together. It’s good.”

“But, you know, the boys are okay with this? They know?”

“They know,” Nancy admits. She pauses. “They’re in this just as much as I am.”

Karen is silent for a moment before she says, “Oh.”

Nancy laughs, a little uncomfortable. “Yeah,” she mumbles. “I know.”

Holly is humming off-key. They keep driving.

———

Eventually, Jonathan goes home. It’s late afternoon. Will is there watching television, and his mother is bumbling around the kitchen.

He tosses down his bag and goes to her. “Need any help?”

Joyce turns to him. “Oh! Sure. Can you grab the butter for me?”

Jonathan goes to the fridge.

“How was your day?” she asks, stirring something on the stove.

“It was okay,” he says, handing over the wax-wrapped stick of butter.

“Thanks,” she says. “Just okay?”

“Good,” he corrects. “I was at Steve’s doing homework.”

“Steve seems nice,” Joyce says, “I’m glad you guys figured things out.”

Jonathan leans against the table with one hand, the other nervously rubbing at the back of his neck. “Uh, yeah. Me too.”

“How’s Nancy?” she asks now. “Such a sweet girl.”

“She’s good, too. She did some work with us, but then she had to go.”

His mother hums assent. “You should invite them over again. You can watch a movie or something. I can lend you some money for pizza, if you want,” she offers.

“I think Steve’s hosting this week, but maybe next time,” he lies. But he says, “Thanks, Mom.”

“I’m just so happy you made friends,” she says, voice wavering just slightly. 

Jonathan stands up. He cannot handle his mother crying right now, it would just worry Will and get him wound up. 

He forces a shrug. “I guess,” he says, but smiles at her. He leaves the kitchen, letting her have a moment to recover as well as making his escape.

He retrieves his bag and retreats to his bedroom.

Later, he’s listening to music in his room and letting his thoughts go.

_“Sometimes you completely disappear on us,”_ Steve had said.

Well, he wasn’t used to having two different people even notice him, let alone holding their focus, so, yeah, sometimes he still lets his mind wander off.

Honestly, he didn’t expect either of them to say anything, especially Steve. Their relationship was tenuous and hesitant, and both of them were guilty of using Nancy as some sort of buffer.

And he had said _“on us,”_ like it had meant something to him. Jonathan didn’t know what to do with that.

This thing between the three of them still feels unusual, because it is, but he’s starting to accept that it isn’t bad. Actually, it’s really, really good, most of the time. It makes life a little more livable, enjoyable.

He’s scared. He doesn’t want to admit it, but he’s scared of liking Steve too much. Of what it means.

It didn’t help that he’s just waiting for Steve to start laughing at him, and it all turns out to be a huge joke to him.

Jonathan’s stuck. He doesn’t want to lose Nancy and Steve, but he feels like going all in could only end badly.

He tunes back in to his music. His heart skips a beat.

_“Should I stay or should I go?”_

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> If it was unclear, 15 was a direct continuation of Valentine's week (for them). So even though WE lost two months to the passage of time, they were preserved in that moment of wonderful until I pulled them out again.
> 
> I read a fic where Jonathan introduces Steve to the Violent Femmes (starting with Blister in the Sun, of course). It made my heart happy, and also led me back to the music. 
> 
> Karen Wheeler may be sugarcoated, but fuck it. I can only handle so much drama. Speaking of drama...
> 
> Sorry in advance, I guess? *nervous evil laughter*


	17. Part XVII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Don't say I never gave you nothin'...  
> (I meant to post this days ago, oops)

On the other side of the forest, Steve is thinking along the same lines as Jonathan.

_What are we really doing?_

Steve had been trying, in what few ways he knew how. He had limited—almost nonexistent but not quite—experience with being attracted to other boys, and even less than that in actively pursuing them. 

He’d had one crush in middle school to his best friend, who had immediately stopped hanging out with him when he found out. He never called him names or anything so terrible, but the kid's father had been very vocal about his beliefs and so the other boy had left to avoid having to explain later on.

Last Steve heard, that kid’s parents had divorced and he and his mom had moved out of Hawkins. Steve thought he heard a rumor it was over the boy, Charlie, having been caught with another boy by his father and getting beaten to a pulp—but it had only been a rumor, and now Charlie was long gone.

So, _really_ , the only experience he had had was abandonment and fear.

This felt nothing like that—but that didn’t mean he shouldn’t be cautious.

Plus, there was Nancy. Beautiful, sweet, amazing Nancy Wheeler, who had swept him up so quickly that his world had tilted on its axis. Who had brought him out of the smoke and led him to this new world of monsters but also of love and he wouldn’t trade it for anything, not at all.

Steve wishes he could change a lot of things about last November, but Nancy and Jonathan—he can’t even imagine. He doesn’t want to.

He supposes that’s his answer. Now, he has to figure out what to do about it.

———

Friday reveals itself to them as Nancy’s sliding into the passenger seat of Steve’s car that morning. 

“Jonathan called. His car started making weird noises this morning. He asked for a ride to school,” Nancy explains.

Steve nods. “I wonder why he didn’t just call me?” he wonders aloud.

Nancy shrugs. 

He drives toward the Byers’ house.

Jonathan’s perched atop the hood of his car when they arrive, waiting for them.

He jumps down and jogs over to the car, gingerly putting himself into the backseat. “Sorry,” he says, teeth chattering slightly.

“It’s no problem,” Steve tells him. “Don’t worry about it.” He tries his best at a warm smile.

Jonathan’s eyes widen, but he manages to return it.

“Let’s go,” Nancy says softly, hand on Steve’s thigh.

They do.

———

The day passes like practically any other, but with something having stowed away just under the surface.

Neither Jonathan nor Steve can put their finger on it, give it a name. Nancy seems unbothered, almost like she’s basking in it.

At lunch, she’s sitting on the same side as Jonathan and leaning into him slightly. For them, it’s completely normal—but for school it’s maybe a little more affectionate than usual.

Jonathan seems very aware of it, eyes jumping around the cafeteria anxiously.

Steve manages to catch his eye, knocking his foot gently with his own. 

“Bathroom break, I’ll be back,” Nancy says, getting up and heading toward the hall.

The boys sit in (somewhat) comfortable silence. But, of course, it doesn’t last.

“What do we have here?” a voice leers. Tommy drops down into Nancy’s empty spot.

Jonathan’s clearly uncomfortable, but he doesn’t move. Steve drops his sandwich, less than pleased. “What do you want, Tommy?”

Tommy smiles a shit-eating grin. It makes Steve feel sick.

There’s a moment when Steve realizes something’s wrong, but it’s just a moment too late. Tommy’s already pushed Jonathan off the bench.

Steve rushes to get up and keep Tommy from kicking Jonathan, and he takes Tommy down to the floor with him.

Other kids are already buzzing and circling up around them. Tommy’s already started in on Steve, pushing him into the floor and going in for his jaw.

Jonathan’s back on his feet, and in a rush of adrenaline, grabs Tommy by the collar and pulls him up, ready with a right hook.

Tommy manages to catch him in the side, but still takes the hit. It dazes him for a split second before he and Jonathan are face-to-face, squaring up to do this properly.

Steve’s getting up, going in towards Tommy again, but there’s a hand on his arm holding him back.

It’s Nancy, looking a little disheveled and a lot pissed off. Her left cheek is bright pink, with small, barely visible red scratches. The hand on Steve is also red, and there’s a single smear of blood that can’t be her own.

Both of them turn back to find Tommy and Jonathan still at it, and even though Jonathan’s holding his own, he’s still taken some hits. He’s standing at an angle, free arm partially cradling his ribs.

Steve and Nancy move at the same time. Steve is pulling Jonathan back, and Nancy’s putting herself between them, catching Tommy off guard with a well-aimed kick to the groin.

Carol comes barreling in, nose bleeding, immediately going to Tommy’s side.

“I’m done with this,” Nancy says. “ _Fuck off_ , Tommy.”

Suddenly there’s a whistle from the other side of the cafeteria, and the cavalry’s coming.

Jonathan reaches out for her and she goes, and the three of them use the chaos to flee the cafeteria.

———

They escape out to the parking lot, Nancy leading and Steve supporting Jonathan with one arm.

“Oh my god, are you okay?” Steve asks Jonathan when they reach his car.

“I’m fine,” he groans. “What about you?”

“I got off easy compared to you, dude.”

“Well, I figured I’d have a better shot against him.”

“You were right,” Nancy interjects. “What just happened?”

Steve shifts his hold on Jonathan, letting him lean against the side of the car. “Tommy,” he sighs, “being _Tommy_. What about you?”

“Carol,” Nancy says, brushing some hair away from her face. “We should get out of here, before someone comes looking.”

“No arguments here,” Jonathan coughs.

Steve pulls the nearest door open and tries to help Jonathan inside as gently as possible, climbing in behind him.

Nancy puts her hand back and Steve gives her the keys.

As the car roars and Nancy pulls out of the lot, Steve starts pulling off Jonathan’s jacket.

“How bad is it?” he asks.

Jonathan laughs dryly. “It sucks. But better me than you.” 

Steve lifts the hem of his shirt and examines his bruised torso. “Do you think anything’s broken?”

Jonathan shakes his head. “I’ve done broken ribs before, this isn’t it. Lucky for me.”

Steve lets the fabric go, watching Jonathan watch him. The air in the car hums with nervous energy.

“Why did you go after him?” Steve asks. “He’s _my_ problem, I should’ve—”

“He went after me first. I should be the one asking you that,” Jonathan grunts, cutting him off.

“He’s only after you two because of me, because of last year, it’s all my fault—”

And then Jonathan’s kissing him. His lower lip stings with the sudden pressure, but he ignores it. Because Jonathan Byers is _kissing him._

And so he kisses back.

It’s rough, it’s quick, but it happens and then it’s over, both of them breathing into the small space between them. 

They don’t say anything else. They keep moving. When Steve glances at Nancy in the rearview mirror, she’s smiling.

———

They go to Steve’s, because _where else would they go_ , and Steve and Nancy half-carry Jonathan to the couch. Nancy goes after ice and a first aid kit, while Steve tries to get Jonathan comfortable. 

Jonathan’s face is red, some of it bruising but mostly blushing. Steve can’t stop smiling at him.

“Hey,” Steve says. It’s the first time either of them have spoken since the car. “Do you want me to call your mom?”

Jonathan shakes his head. “No, it’s fine.”

Nancy walks back in, a bag of frozen peas and a small kit in her hands. 

“We probably should, before school does,” she admits, sitting down beside him and taking his hand, settling the bag of peas around it. “I’m sure Tommy and Carol will give us up with some story about us attacking them.”

“Plus, you should make sure she knows you’re okay. She’ll worry, but she’ll worry less if she hears it from you,” Steve adds.

He hesitates, but nods. 

Steve turns to Nancy. “Same goes for you,” he tells her, hand on her shoulder. “How’s the cheek? Hand?”

Nancy scoffs. “Negligible compared to him. My hand’s fine, I’m not you.”

Jonathan laughs, coughing a little at the end.

“It’s true,” she insists, “the reason you guys mess up your hands so easily is because you’re holding them wrong.” 

“Plus, Carol’s a marshmallow,” Steve adds.

There’s a moment of silence before all three of them erupt in laughter, the sheer ridiculousness of the day finally catching up with them.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Nancy absolutely knows proper form, y'all.
> 
> This one's a little longer, but the next one's a bit shorter, so...balance. I _totally_ did that on purpose, _yeah._
> 
> If you haven't noticed, I also tend to stay pretty PG-13 with the smut. I'm a "behind-closed-doors" writer--not by choice, I'm just not good at writing that stuff. (There's a reason for that, I'm sure...)
> 
> I can't tell if this feels too fast or nah? It took so long that this feels kinds fast--but it takes so long to write properly that it also still feels hella slow. Idk. **(PLEASE HELP ME)**


	18. Part XVIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> OMG I'M SO SORRY I DISAPPEARED AGAIN

Jonathan settles in on the couch after calling his mom, and eventually dozes off with the help of some minor painkillers.

Joyce was understandably upset, but grateful for Steve and Nancy’s actions. After Jonathan made clear that nothing was broken—she knew to take his word for it—she conceded to him staying put for a little while. She agreed to gather up some of his things so they could drive by for them. 

Mrs. Wheeler was not as thrilled. But, to her credit, she didn’t question their decision to leave school, and didn’t push when they danced around the cause of the fight . She wanted Nancy to come home, but Nancy argued to stay and help with Jonathan. They compromised with Nancy agreeing to go home and prove that she was indeed unharmed, and then after that she could go back to Steve’s.

Nancy volunteers to also run by Jonathan’s place for his things, and Steve has no problem being on nurse-duty. So she takes Steve’s car and, for a little while, the boys are left alone.

While Jonathan rests, the school calls. He lets it ring. No one here to answer it, he thinks bitterly.

But then he catches sight of Jonathan, sleeping peacefully despite wearing several angry bruises, and smiles.

———

Nancy’s interlude away from her boys first sees her going home, being fussed over by Karen, having to once again explain the fight (leaving out some details, of course) and lying about being home by curfew. 

The second part involves going to the Byers’ home, being fussed over by Joyce, answering her questions about their bullies-turned-attackers (not having to leave out as many details as with her own mother) and promising to have Jonathan call her in the morning.

While the hug from her own mother as she was leaving seemed obligatory, routine, the hug Nancy receives from Jonathan’s mother catches her off guard. She knows it shouldn’t, not after their surprising interaction only a week ago. But she finds herself suddenly feeling very vulnerable in Joyce Byers’ embrace.

“I’m so glad Jonathan has you,” Joyce murmurs, her voice wavering. “Both of you.”

Nancy sighs. “I don’t know what I’d do without them,” she whispers. 

Joyce leans back, still holding Nancy’s arms but looking her in the eye. “You shouldn’t have to.”

Nancy thinks about that moment the entire drive back to house.

Jonathan starts to stir as Nancy’s returning. She goes to him and rests her head on his shoulder, arm across his stomach carefully.

She sighs into him. 

“Everything okay?” he asks groggily.

Steve appears from the kitchen, and she reaches out to him. He settles beside Jonathan’s legs; he gives one hand to Nancy while the other rests on Jonathan’s knee.

Nancy smiles. “It is now.”

———

A survey of their injuries reminds them how lucky they got. For Nancy, a few scratches and a barely-bruised hand; Steve, a split lip, a chin bruise, and a solid shot to the gut; Jonathan, by far the worst, with bruised knuckles, a sore rib or two, a small bump just above his forehead, and his walk leaning slightly to one side but not completely impaired. 

They’re all succumbing to the inevitable crash following the adrenaline rush at lunch. Nancy suggests moving up to the bed, which is better suited for three people than the couch. No one argues—whether that’s because of exhaustion or something else, they don’t know.

After helping Jonathan up the stairs and into his room, Steve immediately flops face-first into the middle of the mattress. There are two soft huffs of amusement behind him, and the mattress shifts.

First, on his left; sweet-smelling Nancy tucking herself under his arm. Steve can feel her reach out, beckon Jonathan in. 

After a moment’s hesitation, the other side dips and there’s Jonathan, warm and solid next to him. Nancy’s hand is draped over the small of Steve’s back, presumably to reach Jonathan beside him. 

Steve wiggles his hips slightly and then flips over, onto his back. He loops an arm around Nancy’s shoulders and lets his hand rest, palm open, between Jonathan and him. 

As they all start to settle and drift, Steve feels tentative fingers exploring his wrist, and the weight of Nancy’s arm bridging over them at his waist. 

They sleep. Warm, safe, and loved; they sleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> *wiggles eyebrows suggestively*  
> again, sorry i'm an amateur Houdini  
> but it's about to be finals--ugh--and then after that i'm FREE  
> so maybe summer will be better? at least for a little bit.
> 
> i might give this story a "tentative" ending around ch. 22-25  
> (depending on how prolific i am until i leave for my summer program)
> 
> but i don't think i'll be able to leave this story alone for too long  
> so i might continue it/write a sequel????  
> but no promises because i'm a mess
> 
> happy belated birthday @EvieSmallwood  
> my birthday was on the 16th, #aprilbabies
> 
> seriously, you guys leave the sweetest, bestest comments a girl could ask for.  
> *blows all the kisses at y'all*


	19. Part XIX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> HOLY GOD I AM SO SORRY FOR DISAPPEARING  
> I have no excuse. I'm just a horrible person. Sorry.  
> Here, have some fluff. 
> 
> *throws a new chapter at your lovely faces*
> 
> Here's hoping we can finish this story without another one of my unannounced breaks.

Steve wakes sandwiched between Jonathan and Nancy. The other boy’s back is pressed to his front, foot tucked between his legs and Steve’s hand on his hip. Jonathan still sleeps deeply.

Behind him, Nancy is awake in somewhat the same position as he, stroking the toes of one foot gently across his calf, and fingers playing with the ends of his hair. 

He turns his head back towards her. “I guess that’s one way to do it,” Steve whispers.

“Hmm?” Nancy moves her fingers onto his scalp, fingers sinking deeper into his hair.

“Three people, one bed,” Steve laughs softly.

“Mm,” Nancy answers. 

“ _Wha’ time s’it?_ ” Jonathan mumbles, stirring against Steve. 

Nancy checks her watch. “Just after seven,” she supplies. 

Jonathan huffs, but pushes back against Steve warmly. Steve tightens his grip automatically. 

Too tight. Jonathan groans softly. “Sorry,” Steve whispers.

Jonathan hums softly, seemingly unbothered once again, still very much tired.

Steve turns his head toward Nancy. “What time do you have to be home?” he asks. 

“I’m not going anywhere tonight,” she tells him firmly. 

He can tell that pushing the discussion further isn’t the best idea, so he doesn’t. “Okay.”

“Thank you,” she answers.

They continue to lay in bed, warm and quiet.

It’s clear that Jonathan needs the rest—he’s completely out again in a matter of minutes. Steve shifts back slightly without removing himself altogether, and Nancy rearrages herself around him, head on his tilted chest. 

“How do you feel?” she asks him softly. 

Steve scoffs softly. “Peachy,” he teases.

“Not that,” she intones. “About what happened in the car.”

“Oh,” Steve breathes. 

“Yeah,” she nods.

“Um,” Steve starts.

She watches him closely.

“Good. I think,” he adds.

She raises an eyebrow. 

“Great, actually.” He pauses. “But it doesn’t feel real. None of this does. It feels like any minute I’ll wake up and we’ll be back to normal—to whatever normal was before all this.”

She is quiet for a minute, and Steve can practically hear her thinking. _Constantly thinking, she is._ After a moment more, her head moves slightly and she looks up toward him.

“This isn’t a dream,” she tells him, seriously. “This is all real, I promise.”

Steve smiles. “Okay. Don’t let me forget it.”

She smiles back, smaller. “I won’t.”

———

The next time Jonathan wakes, everything remains fuzzy for a little too long. His stomach twists and his body aches, but certainly less so than when they were downstairs before. He groans as he attempts to flip himself over, expecting the other side of the bed to be emtpy. 

It is not. Steve is there, laid out on his back, an arm folded beneath his head. He’s turned to look at Jonathan, eyes soft.

“Welcome back,” he teases. “How was your cat-nap?”

“Fine,” Jon croaks, voice dry with sleep. “Where’s Nancy?”

“Shower,” Steve answers with the lift of a shoulder. 

The sound of the water slowly seeps into the room, as if summoned by Steve’s acknowledgment. 

“You feelin’ any better?” Steve asks him.

Jon huffs. “A little. Still fuzzy.”

Steve nods, looking back up to the ceiling. The arm closest to Jonathan is loose at his side, but Jon can see his fingers twitching slightly.

Before his brain can catch up to talk him out of it, Jonathan’s delicately shuffled himself closer, bruised hand on Steve’s torso, curled against the side of the other boy. 

To his credit, Steve seems unphased. His arm lifts and settles beneath Jon’s neck, hand between his shoulder blades.

“Better,” Jon mumbles. “Warm.”

He feels Steve chuckle softly beneath his palm. 

The water shuts off in the adjacent bathroom, dripping quietly.

A few minutes later, Nancy emerges, hair wavy and damp, wrapped in a plush gray bathrobe.

She leans herself against the doorframe, crossing her arms and letting her head fall gently against the painted wood. She watches them, something strange in her eyes. 

“Well,” Steve says finally, “are you joining us or not?”

She smiles, pushes herself off the frame and approaches the bed.

———

After quiet deliberation, they decide to remain in the bed for the rest of the evening. Mostly because Nancy insists that Jonathan shouldn’t be made to get up and go downstairs. What goes unsaid is that none of them really want to get up, let alone attempt to focus on a movie. 

So they take the night off.

About a quarter after nine, they decide that pajamas are the best course of action.

Before disappearing into the bathroom, Steve throws a pair of flannel sleep pants at Jonathan.

He manages to sit himself up long enough to pull off his jeans and slide them on, then collapses back into the pillows. 

Nancy returns in something she must have brought over before today. Jonathan thinks he vaguely remembers something about her having a curfew, but his head isn’t in the best shape.

She pulls back the bedclothes, something they had left alone until now. Jonathan tries to lift himself up, but she manages to get them out from under him before he can really be any help. 

Whether from sleep or the fight, everything was still blurry around the edges of his awareness. If not for the pain, he might have thought he was still asleep. 

Steve emerges in a similar pair of pants, and a baggy t-shirt. He walks around to Jon’s side of the bed. “Scoot over,” he says.

Jonathan does his best, Nancy helping with gentle hands on his other side. But something still tweaks in his ribs, and a flash of fresh pain sears across his chest.

He breathes in sharply, tense and waiting for his adrenaline to kick in and dull the sensation.

Both Nancy and Steve notice the change immediately and reach for him.

“I’m okay,” he coughs, “just gimme a second.”

“Are you _sure_ that nothing’s broken?” Steve worries.

“Yeah,” Jon groans. “I told you, I know what broken ribs feel like.”

“But how?” Steve asks, before he can stop himself.

Nancy sighs. 

“Sometimes, my dad…” Jonathan starts, “well, Mom and I tried to keep Will out of his way.”

Steve swallows hard. “I’m sorry.”

“It was a while ago, now. But I promise, just bruising—a sprain at most.”

Steve nods. “Okay.”

Jonathan resettles and turns toward Nancy, who lets herself be folded into his arms. 

Steve lies on his back and closes his eyes.

Dammit, he thinks.

“You’re too far away, dumbass,” Jonathan mumbles.

Steve laughs softly. “Sorry.” He rolls over and curls his arms around Jon’s waist, and then Nancy’s.

“I call middle next time,” she murmurs petulantly.


	20. Part XX

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Tried something different with the first half of this chapter. 
> 
> And then some Stonathan to ease the pain of my frequent absences.

After Nancy doesn’t come home Friday night, Karen Wheeler takes it upon herself to retrieve her from the Harrington home.

Saturday morning, early—but not too early—she’s at the door patiently waiting for someone to answer her knocking.

Steve does, not even pretending to look surprised that his girlfriend’s mother is suddenly at his door.

Steve smiles, charming as ever, even in his pajamas with a split lip and a dark purple bruise on his chin. 

“Good morning, Mrs. Wheeler,” he says.

“Good morning, Steve. I assume Nancy is here?”

He nods, clearly trying not to look amused. “She’s in the kitchen with Jonathan.” He steps back and gestures for her to come in.

After a moment’s hesitation, she does.

She finds her daughter and the older Byers boy similarly dressed in the kitchen, Nancy sitting with him at the table and gently holding a half-bag of frozen produce to his forehead.

Clearly, Nancy had undersold the events that had unfolded in the cafeteria the afternoon before. The boy sitting beside her looked properly beaten, and had he been Karen’s own child he’d have been hospitalized already. She forces herself to breathe through it, turning her attention back to Nancy, whose scratches were slightly more visible without the extra redness in her cheeks.

“Hi, Mom,” Nancy says, replacing her hand on the bag with one of Jonathan’s own and rising from the chair.

“Nancy,” she answers, unsure of what else to say.

“I’ll go get dressed,” Nancy tells her, quickly disappearing up the stairs. 

Karen is left standing there, alone with these boys she barely knows but her daughter seems to never leave.

“Would you like a glass of water?” Steve asks, ever the polite host.

“No, thank you.” Her maternal drive pushes her forward, sending her to the seat her daughter vacated beside the battered Jonathan.

She takes the bag from his forehead and looks at the extent of the damage.

The bump is still raised and darkly bruised, and as she looks at him closer she notices the slight lean to the boy’s posture. He’s got an arm braced over his chest. His eyes occasionally float in and out of focus.

Steve sweeps around behind him, placing a glass of water in his now empty hand. Jonathan drinks half of it down in two gulps, then slowly slides the cup onto the table.

“It’s not as bad as it looks,” Jonathan tells her, attempting to straighten his back before letting gravity pull him into the chair’s back. 

“It looks pretty bad,” is all she can say.

“I’ve had worse,” he adds softly. This does not make her feel better. She remembers the brief flashes of Lonny’s temper that she had tried to ignore. She remembers when Joyce dropped off Will a few years back, blaming her bruised wrist on a work accident.

Karen hands Jonathan back the freezer bag, and stands. She brushes a piece of hair out of his eyes and retreats to the other side of the kitchen. “What was this fight about, then?” she asks the room.

Nancy’s just reappeared at the bottom of the stairs. “It was a misunderstanding,” she offers.

“About what?”

Steve coughs. Jonathan sags in his chair.

“About…” Nancy says, “just—some kids were spreading rumors, and it escalated.”

She turns head-on to her daughter. “I would really appreciate the truth here, Nancy.”

“It was me,” Jonathan interjects. “They were giving Nancy and Steve a hard time for hanging out with me.”

“Honestly,” Steve sighs, “they were my stupid friends. It should’ve been my fight.”

“Your friends?” Karen asks.

Steve nods. “Before,” he says. They all know what he means.

Even Mrs. Wheeler. She saw how the unusual events of last November had changed the town, had especially changed her own children. Everything was before or after that time, now.

She returned to her thoughts. “What kind of rumors?”

“Does it matter?” Nancy asks, softly.

“If it affects you, then yes.”

Nancy nods. “Okay,” she agrees. She steps down and goes to Steve, kissing him on her tiptoes, and whispers something in his ear. After that she goes to Jonathan and does the same, kissing him quickly and murmuring something to him softly.

Mrs. Wheeler does her best to stay expressionless.

Nancy returns to her mother’s side, backpack over her shoulder. “Let’s go,” she says.

As they’re leaving, Karen glances back and sees Steve sit down next to Jonathan and lean in close.

But then the door closes behind her.

———

Despite all the thoughts clearly bounding around in her mother’s head, the car ride is nearly silent until they pull into their driveway.

Mrs. Wheeler turns off the car, but doesn’t move to open the door.

“Are you being safe?” her mother asks softly.

Nancy’s face screws up uncomfortably. “Gross, Mom.”

“Well, are you?”

“I mean, yes, but it’s—we aren’t—”

“I don’t understand,” her mother says. 

Nancy sighs. “Those kids at school, they say horrible things about us when they don’t even know. They don’t know anything about it, but because it’s different it’s automatically wrong?”

“Not necessarily,” Karen says, “But—”

“I love them, Mom,” Nancy shouts, tears in her eyes. “And they love me. They make me happy. Isn’t that all that matters?”

Mrs. Wheeler looks down into her lap. “I wish it was, Nancy, but the rest of the world, they don’t always think that way.”

“And you?” Nancy asks, voice breaking. “Do you think that we’re _wrong_ , Mom?”

“I don’t know,” her mother confesses. “I honestly don’t know what to think, honey.”

Nancy sobs softly. “Well, let me know when you do,” she cries, leaving her mother alone in the car.

As Nancy runs inside the house, Karen grips the steering wheel. “I’m sorry,” she says to the empty car. “I’m so sorry.”

———

The loss of Nancy leaves Steve in charge of getting Jonathan home. 

Steve manages to talk the other boy into a shower, but starts to question that as soon as he realizes Jonathan will need help to do so.

Steve sets Jon down on his bed while starting the shower, fetching a towel, and helping Jonathan get his shirt off without having to move his ribs.

“I think I’ve got it from here,” Jon says, embarassed. 

“You sure?” Steve asks.

Jonathan nods, gently pushing Steve back out of the bathroom before closing the door. Luckily, Jonathan leaves it unlocked, and Steve sighs in resignation.

He goes to the bed and begins straightening it, unsure of what else to do. He knows that just sitting outside the door is probably too much, but he figures busying himself nearby is probably okay.

Making the bed takes less time than he hoped, and so now he’s waiting awkwardly again. 

Knowing he’ll have to leave the house eventually, he makes himself get dressed. After pulling on his socks, he drops back onto his bed, legs hanging over the edge, and stares at the ceiling.

Steve doesn’t know how he can still fall asleep after all of the sleeping they’ve done in the past day, but as he’s lying there he dozes off.

He’s roused by the bed dipping beside him, and he looks up to find Jonathan smiling at him through his damp hair, already dressed.

“You could have woken me,” Steve tells him, blinking until his eyesight returns to normal. 

“I did okay,” Jonathan says. “I won’t have you to hover over me forever.”

“But I like hovering,” Steve whines softly, sitting up.

“Really?”

Steve looks down at their hands between them, and reaches out his pinky to link with Jonathan’s.

“Well,” Steve says, “I don’t hate it. It’s better than you hurting yourself.”

Jonathan twines the rest of their fingers, resting their joined hands on his knee.

“Can I kiss you?” Steve asks him.

Jonathan rolls his eyes, blushing. “Idiot,” he teases softly.

And so Steve kisses him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i will make myself finish this story if it kills me (it might)
> 
> writing karen wheeler was so much fun, but it was so out of my comfort zone. i don't know how it reads to y'all.   
> feedback plz and ty
> 
> y'all, i want to give you all the love and smut you deserve, but writing it makes me ANXIOUS  
> so, slow going. i'm trying, tho  
> i hope the last bits don't fall flat because i'm a n00b at writing sex  
> (esp between THREE people)  
> but it's coming. i promise. we will have 25 chapters by the end of this.


	21. Part XXI

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I GOT EMOTIONAL ABOUT STEVE AND JOYCE, Y'ALL
> 
> also, i know this is short. i'm trying.

The boys are interrupted a few minutes later by the phone ringing. Steve answers from the receiver in his room. 

It’s Nancy, checking in on them and being vague about what happened with her mother. She tells Steve that she’s stuck at home for the weekend, but will call to check in.

She sounds upset, but when Steve asks she says that it’s fine, she just needs time to think. 

She tells him to make sure to get Jonathan home okay. He promises to do so.

Just before he thinks she’s going to hang up, he hears her sniffle. “ _I love you. Both of you._ ”

Steve looks over to find Jonathan having wandered off. “We love you, too, Nance. It’ll be okay, yeah? We’ll all be okay.”

“ _Okay. Bye, Steve._ ” The line clicks. 

———

Steve catches up with Jonathan near the bottom of the stairs, struggling but determined. Steve waits patiently while he finishes the last few steps and then sweeps past him into the kitchen.

When Jonathan gets there, Steve hands him a glass of water and a couple of aspirin.

Jonathan gladly accepts the water, waving off the medicine. “I’m fine,” he lies.

Steve rolls his eyes. “Stubborn,” he mutters under his breath. 

Jonathan stays leaning against the counter, drinking his water slowly, while Steve starts gathering his things. 

Jonathan rinses his glass and meets Steve at the door, whose pulling on his shoes. He toes on his own, ignoring the fact that he’s walking on the backs of them in favor of not bending down to fix them.

They shuffle out to Steve’s car. 

———

The car ride to the Byers’ home is short. It’s a walkable distance normally, but not in Jonathan’s current state. 

They sit outside, hesitating.

“You ready?” Jon asks him. 

Steve chuckles. “For what?”

“For my mom,” he says. 

“I think I can handle it,” he smirks. 

Jonathan rolls his eyes, and then stares gently at Steve.

Steve leans forward, pressing his lips to Jonathan’s firmly. “Let’s go,” he says softly. They climb out of the car. 

Joyce beats them to the door, of course.

“Good morning,” she says with a worried smile. 

“Hi, Mom,” Jon says, stepping forward first to allow her to examine him. “Just a few sprained ribs. I’ve had worse,” he shrugs, then winces slightly.

She nods sadly. “But you’re feeling okay?” She runs her hands hand up and down his arms, giving him a nervous once-over.

“I’ll be fine,” he concedes. 

She gives half a smile. “Okay.”

After a moment, she backs through the door and gestures for them to enter. “Come on in out of the cold, then.”

Will’s on the couch watching TV. Jonathan ruffles his hair as he passes. Will smiles, waves at Steve, and quickly returns to his cartoon. 

“You hungry?” Joyce asks them.

“I’m all good, Mom. I think I’ll just go lay down.” 

“Alright, then. Just yell when you need something,” she says, allowing Jonathan and Steve to disappear down the hallway.

Jonathan watches Steve’s face as they walk back toward his room. “You good?” he asks.

Steve nods, confused but quiet. 

They leave the door cracked slightly. 

“Nancy got a little anxious first time coming back here,” Jonathan confesses. 

Steve nods. “It doesn’t seem like the same place to me,” he offers. “Your brother’s on the couch watching cartoons and your mom’s puttering around the kitchen. The house is warmer, now.”

Jonathan smiles. “That’s how I feel. Sometimes when I’m alone, though, I still get nervous.”

“Will is proof that you made it through all that,” Steve says, taking a step forward. 

Jonathan looks at him for a moment, surprised, and then leans forward to kiss him. “Yeah,” he breathes on Steve’s lips. “Thanks.”

They stay there, faces and bodies close. “Is this weird?” Jonathan asks.

“Hell yeah,” Steve laughs. “But, ya know, still good.” 

Jonathan nods, brushing Steve with his hair. “Good weird,” Jonathan says. It’s something that they’ve said before about their situation. It feels right.

“Good weird,” Steve repeats, pressing a kiss to Jon’s brow. 

———

As Steve walks back through Jonathan’s bedroom door, he realizes now he has to face Joyce alone.

He had forgotten about that part of dropping Jonathan off.

He walks slowly down the hallway, hands in his pockets, and finds Joyce at the kitchen table.

“Thank you,” she says as he approaches. 

“It’s nothing,” he says. 

“It’s everything,” she tells him. “Nancy told me what happened. I’m sorry those kids are giving you a hard time.”

“They’ll get over it,” Steve says, unsure. “They’re still sore about last year.”

“But that won’t be the end of it, I don’t think,” she sighs. “People are going to think whatever it is they want to think.”

“I know,” Steve says, looking down at his shoes. 

“I’m just glad you have each other.” She stands. “For however long.”

Steve straightens. “Jonathan will always have us. Doesn’t matter how. I promise.”

Joyce nods, eyes welling. “Thank you,” she says again.

Steve shakes his head. “It’s nothing,” he says with a smile. 

Joyce laughs wetly. “It’s everything.” She hugs him.

Steve stills for a moment, then settles into the embrace. “It really is,” he whispers.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> on a separate note, please send me ideas for movie night. my 70-80s film knowledge has worn thin.


	22. Part XXII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> y'all i'm gettin' real emotional and stuff

On Sunday, Nancy asks to stay home rather than go to church. Her mother is hesitant, but allows it nonetheless. 

As the rest of the family is shuffling out to the car, Nancy pulls Mike aside. 

“Can I borrow your bike?” she asks quietly.

He nods. “What for?” he questions. 

“I need some air,” she tells him. He takes the answer he’s given. 

“Be careful,” he says, turning back toward the door. 

As Nancy watches her brother leave, it strikes her how much he’s had to grow up since last November. Her heart aches a little for the childhood he lost then, for the person he had to become and the things he had to face. 

He lost someone just like she did. She hoped his friends helped a little. Like hers did.

As soon as the car is clear of the block, she throws on a jacket and her shoes, and heads out the back door.

———

She doesn’t really know where she’s going until she’s already there. She’s at Steve’s house, but she doesn’t go to the door. 

She goes around back to the pool. 

She puts down the bike and walks up to the edge of the water. The water is clear, a small wisp of steam floats past her feet.

She sits.

“I don’t know where else to go,” she says aloud. “I need you so much right now.”

There is no response. Only the wind.

“I’m sorry I left you,” Nancy cries softly. “I would take it back if I could. But I can’t.”

“It’s so unfair, and it’s all my fault. I’m so, so sorry, Barb,” she sobs.

The water is still. 

Nancy gathers up her knees and presses her face into them, the cold attracted to her tears. She buries them in the denim of her jeans.

She doesn’t know how long she sits there. When she looks up, face red and raw from crying, it seems like nothing’s changed. 

Because nothing has. 

Nancy hears the slide of the glass door behind her, and breathes out slowly. 

“Hey.”

Steve sits down next to her, close but not quite touching.

“I wish I’d known her better,” he says quietly. 

“Me too,” Nancy whispers, voice shaking.

Steve wraps an arm around her, and she collapses into him. 

———

 _“She would have liked you—like this.”_ The words sit heavily in the back of his throat.

After Nancy leaves, Steve is at a loss of what to do. He’d been caught off guard finding her by the pool, but he’d figured it out quickly enough. He’d left her alone for as long as he could stand.

She didn’t stay long after that, mumbled something about her parents and church, and then rode off on her brother’s bike. 

It had hurt to let her go like that, but he knew he couldn’t hold her back. 

He stands, staring into the water for a moment. 

Last November had brought them together, true, but it had ripped them up in the process. He is constantly stuck between gratitude and regret for that time. And fear. Fear’s there, too. 

_I’m sorry,_ he thinks. _Please look after her._

Then, with a solemn nod to the pool, he goes back inside.

———

Nancy finds herself taking the long way home, riding past the middle school. She does not approach, but pauses across the street. It’s one of the places that Nancy knows will never feel normal again. 

Not after everything. 

Not after Eleven. 

Nancy hadn’t spent as much time with the girl as her brother, but she still felt an ache in her chest after she was gone.

After all, Eleven had done what Nancy couldn’t; she had found Barb. 

And despite the unusual connection the girl had with the “upside-down”, she had been just as much a victim of it as the rest of them that November.

 _I hope you’re okay out there,_ Nancy thinks. _Stay safe. Come back._

_Come home._

———

She spends the rest of the day doing homework. It was relaxing, to be in control of something.

After dinner, the phone rings. She hears her mother pick it up downstairs.

“Nancy! It’s Jonathan!”

“I got it!” she calls back. She goes to her phone. “Hello?” she answers.

 _“Hey,”_ Jonathan greets. _“How are you?”_

She settles down on the edge of her bed, legs tucked beneath her. “I’m okay,” she tells him. “How are you?”

He pauses, as if he’s caught her in a lie. He sighs, _“A little better now.”_

“Good. I miss you.”

_“I miss you, too, Nance.”_

“Are you going to school tomorrow?” she asks. 

_“Yeah,”_ he sighs. _“I can’t afford to miss much more than I already have this year.”_

She nods into the receiver but doesn’t say anything.

_“I can’t really drive, though, so Steve offered to pick me up in the morning.”_

“That’s nice,” she says, picking at a small fray in her jeans. 

_“Hey,”_ he says after a moment, _“you sure you’re okay?”_

 _Ah. Steve._ “Yeah,” she says. “I’ll be fine.” It’s not a lie, but it doesn’t feel entirely true.

_“You know you can talk to me, right?”_

“I do,” she sighs, “just—not right now, okay?”

He hesitates again, but holds his tongue. _“Okay. I’ll see you in the morning then?”_ he asks. 

“Sure. Goodnight, Jonathan.”

_“Goodnight, Nancy.”_

She hangs up the phone, and lays back on her bed.

They’ll be okay; she knows that. It doesn’t make her feel any better, doesn’t dissolve the dead weight in her chest.

———

Eventually she tries to go back to her work, but finds herself distracted and unfocused. 

So Nancy sets the textbooks aside, and without thinking about it goes in search of her brother.

His door is slightly ajar, and she can hear him talking to someone, muffled and far away.

Knocking, she calls, “Mike?”

There’s a quiet murmur and then he calls back, “You can come in.”

She pushes the door forward with the palm of her hand flattened against the wood. “Hey,” she starts. Her brother’s on his bed, still in his church clothes—minus the jacket and slightly disheveled. She gestures to the bed, “Can I?”

He pauses, nods. She sits down by his feet. 

“Thanks for letting me borrow your bike.”

“S’fine,” he shrugs.

“I went to see Barb,” she says carefully, “…and Eleven.”

Mike’s eyes widen slightly, but he says nothing. He looks back down at his hands.

“Do they help?” 

Mike looks up again.

“Your friends, do they help?”

“Yeah,” he says. “They do.”

“Good,” she sighs. 

“Do yours?” he asks.

She smiles. “Most of the time, yeah.”

He nods. 

They sit in the quiet for a minute, digesting.

Nancy can’t remember which of them moves first, but soon her brother’s arms are wrapped around her neck, heavy and warm while she holds him close, hands on his back. 

Before everything, she didn’t think it was possible to need her brother this much. It constantly catches her off guard, how much has changed between them since last Fall. 

She ruffles his hair with one hand, and he pulls back. After they separate, she smiles.

He mostly returns it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> sorry if the part w mike is awkward, i was struggling a bit
> 
> beginning of the end incoming  
> (not forever but you know, for now)
> 
> I MIGHT ACTUALLY FINISH THIS WITHOUT HOUDINI-ING AGAIN YAY ME


	23. Part XXIII

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> the first draft of this chapter was pretty rough, just a head's up

The next morning, everything is suddenly different. 

No more secrets. Not from parents (Steve’s didn’t count), not at school (by now the news had spread in one way or another), and not from each other. 

It isn’t perfect, far from it, but it feels like progress nonetheless. 

———

Steve picks up Jonathan first—his house is closer—but Nancy still finds the passenger seat open for her when they pull into her driveway. She slides in, gives each of her boys a quick kiss, and they carry on.

When they arrive at school, there are whispers. Of course there are. 

Even so, the trio hardly notices. 

Jonathan’s still a little obviously roughed up; Steve’s bruises have faded to yellow-green. 

They instinctively stay close to each other. They walk each other to their lockers. They walk each other to class—starting with Jonathan, then Steve, and finally Nancy. 

Somehow Nancy has become the lead in whatever they are, but the boys are actually a little glad for it. 

The day passes as close to normal as it possibly could, after everything else. Lunch is uneventful. The group begins returning to routine, planning a movie night the coming Friday.

Tommy and Carol are absent. Whether they’re hiding or suspended, they don’t know. And, at least for the moment, they don’t care. 

The world slowly restores itself. 

———

The week is the most uneventful in months. Tommy and Carol remain out of sight (and thus, mostly out of mind). School is school—classes, homework, studying. 

Friday creeps up on them. At lunch that day, they discuss potential movie choices.

“How about Grease?” Nancy suggests.

Steve exaggerates a sneer. “Nuh-uh. We have to watch The Evil Dead.”

“I’m fine with whatever,” Jonathan shrugs, forever the passive party amongst them. 

Both Nancy and Steve roll their eyes. Steve then pleads with Jonathan to support him, insisting that he’ll love this one even more than The Thing.

Steve and Nancy leave lunch still bickering playfully while Jonathan lags behind, watching them with a small smile and a warmth in his chest.

They turn back to him at the same time. “You coming?” Nancy asks.

He nods, and limps over to meet them. 

———

By that evening, the argument has been abandoned for the age-old compromise of watching both movies. 

Pizza is ordered. Couch positions are negotiated. Pizza is eaten and a movie is started.

It feels good. Great, even. Not perfect—never perfect—but enough. It feels like a balm on the wounds left behind.

“What are you guys doing for Spring Break?” Steve asks.

Jonathan answers, “Working.”

“Studying,” is Nancy’s response.

“Well, that’s unacceptable,” Steve scoffs. “Spring Break is a mandatory break from all things school _and_ work. It’s like paid vacation days!”

“Except they’re not,” Jonathan smirks. “Paid.”

Steve rolls his eyes. 

“Why, what are you doing?” Nancy turns to him.

“I don’t really have any plans,” he shrugs. They go back to the movie.

But, of course, Steve’s interest has been piqued. “We should go somewhere. All of us, together.”

Nancy and Jonathan hesitate for a moment.

“I mean,” Steve coughs, “We don’t have to. But I think it would be fun for us to get out of Hawkins for a few days.”

They turn to Nancy at the same time, looking to her expectantly.

“Sounds nice,” she coos, brushing some hair out of Steve’s face. 

Jonathan nods. “Yeah, okay. I’m in. But where would we go?”

Steve grins. “I have a few ideas.”

———

Later, Jonathan gets up to switch on some music while Nancy and Steve stay on the couch, tangled up in each other, too comfortable to move.

As Jonathan quietly murmurs the lyrics, Nancy kisses Steve. It starts slow, lazy.

But after a bit it grows more serious, more intense. Jonathan does not sit back down.

Steve notices him standing a few feet away, watching them intently. His mouth still half open on a particular line, clearly distracted by the pair unexpectedly.

His pupils are blown wide, and he finally stops gaping and swallows. Hard.

Steve gives Nancy’s waist a quick squeeze, and she pulls back.

She looks at Jonathan and immediately pulls him back into the couch, mouth on his neck and hand in his hair. 

Jonathan is hesitant with the kiss but eventually settles, relaxing into it.

Nancy has slid slightly farther away from Steve. He releases his loose hold on her waist so that she can maneuver herself onto Jonathan’s lap. 

_So fucking hot_ , Steve thinks, watching them. He’s so focused on their joined lips that he shivers when Nancy’s hand reaches back for him.

Nancy nudges Jonathan’s nose, tilting her head in Steve’s direction. 

When Jonathan’s gaze locks on the other boy, Steve’s already moving in.

Jonathan firmly kisses him back while Steve’s hand finds Jon’s stomach, pushing up his shirt and exposing the skin beneath. Then Nancy rolls her hips slightly, and very quickly Jonathan notices the effect this is all having on him.

On all of them, really. The difference is Nancy and Steve have done this before, while Jonathan has not.

Some of the sensations aren’t necessarily new, but just like back in his room a few weeks ago, the combination of the emotions and physical contact of another person— _persons_ —have his internal alarms starting to go off.

“Wait,” he breathes.

Steve’s face moves back about two inches, but Steve’s hands are still on him. Nancy’s _everything_ is still on him. 

“Stop,” he repeats, and so she does. 

A moment passes.

“Um,” Jonathan gasps. “Yeah, so…”

They both look at him, eyes heavy with confusion and… _lust?_

The word doesn’t feel right in his head. It’s not like he thinks—thought—that he’d never have sex, but now it’s staring him in the face. Literally.

Jonathan looks down, letting his hair fall over his eyes. He has no words, and so he says nothing more.

Nancy in his lap, Steve’s hands on him, and he feels like he can’t breathe.

The silence is long. Too long. Honestly, he’s surprised neither of them have said anything yet.

“Maybe I should go,” he finally mumbles, needing to break the quiet tension thrumming between the three of them.

“Why?” Nancy asks, genuine innocence in her tone. “Did we do something wrong?”

_Shit, no._ That’s not what he meant. “No, just—”

“Too much?” Steve offers.

Jonathan nods, embarrassed. “Too much.”

Nancy hesitates. “Oh.” She lowers her hands from his hair and neck. “Sorry.”

“No,” Jonathan tells her, “it’s me. It’s just…I don’t know.”

She slides herself off his lap sideways toward Steve, falling back down between them onto the couch. Steve’s hands instinctively go to catch her, and then it’s them versus Jonathan.

His chest aches, and not just his ribs. Instinctively, he brings his hands up and away from them. “I’ll just—”

“You don’t have to leave,” Steve argues. 

“I don’t want to be in your way,” he shrugs, making to get up.

Nancy’s hands reach for his, holding but not pulling, looking at him hesitantly.

Steve’s brow furrows. “What are you talking about?”

Jonathan lets her take them. He sits back down on the couch.

“Tell us what’s wrong,” she whispers. 

“I don’t know. It’s…a lot.”

“Okay, so we’ll stop,” Steve nods. 

Jonathan shakes his head. “You don’t—I’ll just go,” he repeats. “No reason for me to get in the way.”

“You’re not in the way,” Nancy insists. “Why would you think that?”

Jonathan shrugs, always his fallback answer. “You guys have done this stuff before, no reason for you two to stop just because of me.”

“But we want you here. We don’t have to do anything.”

“I just…feel like I shouldn’t be here. It feels like—”

They watch him and wait, letting him say what he needs to say.

“I don’t know how to do this.”

Jonathan looks down at his and Nancy’s hands, her thumb smoothing over his knuckles, and he focuses on the softness of the touch.

Yet Jonathan’s shoulders tighten. “I’ve never done this before. I’ve never _felt_ this before,” his voice wavers slightly.

In moments, Jonathan’s surrounded, Nancy and Steve both draping over him, gentle and warm and _right_. 

“What is this?” Jonathan whispers.

Nancy rests her forehead against his, hands on his face. Steve leans into her back, arms wrapped around them both. “Love,” she whispers. “ _This_ is love.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> guys, i'm trying so hard to do the end of this story justice.   
> i just know that the spring break section's gonna be iffy.   
> and maybe i'm imagining it, maybe it is fine on your end--  
> but it doesn't feel the same to me as it did in the early chapters.
> 
> i'm still here, and i'm still writing. but it's a bumpy road, y'all.


	24. Part XXIV

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 9/5/17 penultimate chapter, exactly 1000 words (according to my computer)
> 
> the final chapter is likely to be MUCH longer than other chapters.
> 
> 8/28/18 Update: this sat in my drafts accidentally for almost a year, whoops. Here it is. I might actually finish this thing, tho.

The next week, Jonathan tries to retreat back into himself—just barely. Nancy and Steve do everything they can to keep him from doing so. 

There is a lot of touching—not like that night, but more careful, more tender. Reminders that the three of them _are something_.

At school, it’s Nancy’s shoulder against his at the lunch table. It’s Steve’s arm over their shoulders as they move between classes. It’s casual brushes of their hands through the day and stolen embraces when they’re alone in the dark room or in an empty hallway. 

Despite the fragility of it all, Steve seems giddily nervous whenever the upcoming break is brought up. 

All he’s told them is to leave their week open.

Friday at lunch, he sits down and gives them a lopsided smile. “Chicago,” he says.

Jonathan tilts his head. “What’s in Chicago?”

“My parents’ empty business apartment,” he answers. “And hopefully us.”

“That’s sweet, Steve,” Nancy says sadly, “but my parents would never let me go.”

“That’s exactly why I already asked them.”

“What?” Nancy and Jonathan cry out simultaneously.

“Believe it or not, your mom wasn’t as opposed to the idea as I expected she would be. But it probably helped that I may have lied a _teensy_ bit.”

“Oh no,” she groans, hand to her face.

“Only a little!” Steve insists. “I told her we were going to visit schools, and that my dad would be there. Both of those are mostly true.”

“What do you mean ‘mostly’?” Jonathan asks.

“Well,” Steve grins, “we will be visiting a couple schools. And also, my dad will be in Chicago—for a day. So that’s, like, a quarter of the time we’ll be there. I rounded up.”

Jonathan laughs. “Only you would round twenty-five percent up to a hundred.”

“Thank you,” he replies, practically preening under all the attention. “Oh, and I got the okay from Mother Byers, too.” He winks. Jonathan blushes.

“I cannot believe this,” Nancy sighs. “There’s no way my mom said ‘yes’.”

“Well, I suppose you can ask her after I take you home, but you better be ready to go when I pick you up on Monday.”

“You’re not kidding,” Jonathan states. It’s not a question, but Steve is too giddy to notice.

“Completely serious.”

Nancy covers her face and shakes her head, but under her hands she’s smiling.

———

Nancy is still skeptical when she gets home that afternoon, with Jonathan and Steve in tow to study. After their quick hello shouted to Mrs. Wheeler, Nancy shoos them upstairs to her room while she goes in search of her mother in the kitchen.

“Hi, Mom,” she says, making herself a glass of water. 

Karen smiles. “How was your day, honey?”

“Fine,” she lies. Nancy pauses before asking, “Did Steve ask you about Chicago?”

“He did,” Karen replies carefully, turning away from the stove. “I think it’ll be good for you to go see Northwestern. I mean, it’s not as close as Indiana State, but I know you really want to go to a private school. And Evanston’s only five hours away.”

“Yeah,” Nancy nods, grip tight on her glass. “I just…wanted to say thank you. For, you know, being okay with this.”

“Of course, sweetheart,” her mother coos, brushing some hair behind Nancy’s ear. “I know how important college is to you.”

“Right,” Nancy nods. She repeats, “ _College_.” 

Karen’s smile turns apologetic. “You know I love you, right?”

“Yeah, Mom, I do,” she nods. “Well, I better get upstairs and start studying, then.”

“Okay.”

Nancy starts out of the kitchen, but pauses in the doorway. “Mom?”

“Hmm?” her mother hums, already back to the food she was preparing when Nancy came in.

“I love you, too.”

Nancy runs upstairs and rewards Steve (and Jonathan) with a hundred or so kisses. 

———

Eventually Jonathan and Steve have to go.

Alone in the car, there’s something heavy in the air between them. They make it all the way to Jonathan’s without saying anything, but then Steve stops the car a couple hundred feet from the house, out of direct view.

“Can we talk about this?” Steve asks, sounding exasperated.

Jonathan shrugs, cheeks pink and brow furrowed. 

“No Nancy, just you and me. Just guy stuff. Yeah?”

“Ugh,” Jonathan complains, “you’re making it worse.”

Steve rolls his eyes, but says nothing. He watches Jonathan.

Jonathan shifts uncomfortably under his gaze. “Stop that,” he says.

Steve chuckles. “Stop what?”

“Why do we have to talk about it?” Jonathan gasps in frustration. “Can’t we just move on?”

“Moving on implies closure,” Steve smirks. “Discussion. Resolution.”

“Oh, _shut up_ , Harrington.”

Steve does, and manages to curtail any laughter or further teasing. “Seriously, though.”

Jonathan drops his head into his hands and groans. “I don’t know,” he mumbles.

“Well, what happened?” Steve asks softly. 

“You were there,” Jonathan sneers.

“I mean in your head, or whatever. You’re always up in your head.” Steve means it fondly, but would understand if Jonathan didn’t take it as such. There’s not an immediate reaction from the other boy, so he leaves it.

“It was—just—too much,” he spits out, lifting his head. “You guys are used to this, I’m not.”

Steve nods slowly. “Okay, I get that. But you said you felt like you didn’t belong there.”

“So?”

“So, that’s not true at all, and you should know that.” Steve takes a breath. “All this shit we’ve been through, it’s all been for this. We wouldn’t have fought for this if we didn’t want you.”

Jonathan flinches slightly, but manages to stay facing Steve. “I’m sorry,” he whispers.

Slowly, carefully, Steve reaches for Jonathan’s face, hand gentle on his cheek. “We can always slow down,” he breathes. 

Jonathan hand twitches forward, itching to take hold of Steve’s jacket. After a moment, he lets himself. 

Steve leans in, his face centimeters from Jonathan’s. “But I think we all know that it’s too late to stop,” he murmurs, then proceeds to claim Jonathan’s mouth.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 9/5/17 i don't know if that last line reads as good as it did in my head, but \\_o.o_/
> 
> 8/28/18 Update: this sat in my drafts accidentally for almost a year, whoops. Here it is. I might actually finish this thing, tho.


End file.
